ACCC probes real estate giant REA Group over price gouging amid soaring costs

Australia Broadcast Center

10 hours ago

When consumer Pam Tindill sold her unit in May this year she was staggered by the high marketing costs.
It now costs more to advertise a home for sale in Australia than almost anywhere else in the world.
And, as Ms Tindill learned, one dominant player — REA group, the $32 billion publicly listed company, which is majority owned by the Murdoch-controlled News Corporation — reaps most of the online advertising fees.
Ms Tindill says she paid her real estate agent almost $5,880 for marketing her unit in the north-east of Melbourne, of which a big chunk ($3,289) went to listing the property on REA's property website realestate.com.au.
"We were quite surprised [by the cost to list the property on realestate.com.au] — we had no choice really to pay the price — no negotiating," Ms Tindill told ABC News.
It's that listing cost that has Australia's consumer watchdog, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), probing the digital real estate giant over price gouging concerns.
The regulator has stepped in after years of complaints that REA Group — now the country's biggest real estate listings company — is using its dominant position to the detriment of consumers.
While the cost of providing a home listing on the internet is very low, the Melbourne-headquartered company has established itself as the number one site to list on and, as such, it can hike up its listing prices nearly every year.
But what has the industry most worried is REA Group's business model, which will now also come under the regulator's microscope.
Former ACCC chair Allan Fels says REA Group's "price rises seem to be extraordinary at a time when housing affordability is a key problem for millions of Australians".
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He says while REA never was the subject of investigations during his time as ACCC chair, "they've become immensely powerful since then".
The company has amassed power in Australia's highly lucrative real estate market — by not only investing heavily to become the number one portal to advertise a property for rent or sale, but by taking over a raft of other businesses that hold a wealth of data about consumer habits when it comes to buying and selling a home.
Agents fear it won't be long until REA starts charging them fees for leads on buyers and sellers, and some even speculate that one day REA may operate as one mega real estate agency that could wipe out smaller independent agents altogether.
While REA has said neither of those ambitions are part of its strategy, its rapid growth has real estate agents worried.
For the past few years, REA Group has extended its lead over its main rival, Domain, which is majority-owned by Nine Entertainment.
According to REA Group's own figures, the site attracts more than 133 million average visits — almost four times more visits than rival Domain — from 12.3 million users per month.
Today more than 40,000 real estate professionals use REA's platform every month.
Ms Tindill says during the sales campaign for her now sold home she was "very surprised" by how many buyer views came via realestate.com.au compared to Domain.
"Realestate.com was about 5,000 and Domain was 1,000 or so … I was quite shocked," she said.
While both REA Group and its rival Domain increase the price to list a property each year, it is REA Group — which is estimated by some agents to control more than 80 per cent of the listing market — that's charging the biggest price hikes.
The company charges real estate agents (who pass on the costs to consumers) in two main ways.
First, it charges thousands of dollars for each property listing depending on what geographic area the property being sold is located in.
Real estate agents ABC News has spoken to report that in 2009 the cost to list a home on realestate.com.au was about $75. Now, some premium listings in Sydney cost more than $5,000.
"Essentially what you're seeing [REA Group charge customers] is a postcode tax," according to Aaron Scott, who is the co-founder of bRight Agent — real estate comparison service that connects buyers with agents based on their commissions.
"If you go back to the days of newspaper advertising … you didn't have to say what postcode you were from in order to dictate the price of being able to get an ad.
CEO of the Real Estate Institute of NSW (REINSW) Tim McKibbin wrote to the ACCC about 18 months ago with evidence from agents and consumers of REA heavily increasing its fees.
He argues that REA is getting "very close to having a monopoly" and, as REA becomes more dominant, it is able to charge higher prices.
"They've got complete market saturation ... In some cases, you [a consumer] can be paying $3,000 or $4,000 or more for your classified ad," he said.
But postcode affluence isn't the only factor that feeds into REA pricing.
Some agents think the price set can also depend on other factors like sales volumes.
Jo Mooney, director of Mooney & Estate Agents, an independent agency in the south-east of Melbourne, says listing prices have risen about 8 to 10 per cent a year in most years (except during the pandemic).
Ms Mooney says prices between one suburb, and another can also differ depending on the volume of sales and whether it is classed as a residential zone.
She gives the example of Melbourne's north-east suburbs of Cranbourne and Clyde.
They are neighbouring suburbs with similar priced homes, but Ms Mooney says it is "111.66 per cent more expensive to advertise the Cranbourne home".
"There is a road that divides Clyde and Cranbourne East [in Melbourne] and I have sat in homes on either side of those roads and had to explain to them [the sellers] why."
She was told that Clyde is priced lower because it may still be incorrectly charged as farming land.
Rowan Liew, Associate Director and Auctioneer at CHN Real Estate Group in Melbourne's east, says, agents have to pass on the listing cost charged by REA to consumers because it's a cost of doing business.
But he concedes, "for an everyday mum and dad seller when you tell them the price of a realestate.com premiere listing it does sound like a big figure to them".
He said it was up to the ACCC to determine whether REA Group are price gouging.
"I have noticed that the price has increased year by year," he said, adding that the cost to list a residential property in Melbourne's Doncaster area is now around $4,500.
The second way REA Group makes its money is through subscription fees, which are charged to the agent on top of the listing cost.
They are going up on July 1 — in some cases by almost 80 per cent, according to some agents.
Ms Mooney received an email from REA Group that her monthly subscription was going up almost 34 per cent (from $599 to $799) on July 1.
She says she previously would wear this cost but, with lower commission margins, now is forced to pass some of it onto the consumer.
Ms Mooney is currently on a higher subscription tier, so she says the price hike isn't as severe as that faced by some other agents that may be on a lower tier.
Ms Mooney also has an option to keep her subscription cost unchanged but, to do so, she must sign up to "add yet another expense to sellers" and agree to use REA's Audience Maximiser product, which she argues is effectively "a social media campaign for each property" that she can do for sellers at a lower cost.
Mr Scott says many people selling their homes wouldn't know where their marketing money is going and "really how much is being siphoned off to REA Group".
On May 27 REA made a statement to the ASX noting that it had received a Section 155 Notice, "requiring REA to provide information regarding certain subscription offerings".
It said it was "co-operating fully with the ACCC and is unable to comment further for confidentiality reasons".
That same week the ACCC issued a statement to ABC News saying it did not normally comment on ongoing investigations because they are confidential but that, in this case, it had made an exception.
"Naturally, the ACCC is concerned to ensure there is strong competition in the important real estate sector," an ACCC spokesperson said, adding that "the investigation is at an early stage, and we're yet to form a view."
Another issue is that realestate.com.au have made it one of its conditions that you need a valid real estate agent licence to be able to list a property on its portal.
"They [consumers] have to go through a real estate agent [to list their home for sale] and that real estate agent has to get a 12-month subscription," Mr Scott said.
He adds that, while Domain also has a similar pricing structure, "it really pales in comparison to the market dominance of REA Group".
ABC News sent REA Group questions about its pricing structure and its recent price hikes.
An REA spokesman told ABC News most home owners prefer to sell their properties through a professional agent.
He that while the company's growth rate differs year to year, when looking at it over a decade it is about 14 per cent per year across that period.
REA's pricing for listings "reflects a small percentage of the total property sale transaction value based on the median house value" and he said the average price increase for listings this year was 7 per cent.
"Listing property online is not free, in the same way that any advertising is not free," he said.
He said in the past financial year REA invested over $200 million in innovation and new products and "continue to make large investments in our advertising products and the experience we offer to our audience of buyers, sellers and renters".
Regarding subscription fees charged to real estate agents, REA's spokesman said until now its subscription fees have not changed in over a decade.
He said REA subscriptions now include new tools and resources for agents to help them manage and market listings, access new leads, and promote and grow their businesses.
The company had, for example, recently launched a product called Agency Marketplace within its subscriptions that can help agents win new business.
"This is is now generating more valuable seller leads to our customers — we have increased the number of sellers connecting with agents more than 60 per cent over the past year," he said.
Agents can also use a "basic subscription", which he said costs $249 per agency office per month.
But agents point out the most basic listing gives them limited branding and lower visibility of the property in search results.
It could take months to more than a year for the ACCC to hand down its investigation findings.
In the meantime, REA Group is cementing its dominance and working out new ways it can grow its revenue from agents.
In its latest financial results, REA Group reported an 18 per cent increase in revenue to $1.25 billion for the nine months to March, with quarterly revenue up 12 per cent to $374 million.
Its Australian revenue jumped 11 per cent year-on-year to $340 million, or a 10 per cent lift excluding the acquisition of Realtair (a platform which allows real estate agents to manage the sales process).
Ms Mooney says REA Group has amassed immense market power, not just through its listing portal, but by holding "large interests in each and every facet of the industry" and through every stage of the property listing-to-sale cycle.
She says that makes the company "dangerous" and "very bloody powerful".
It is a long list. REA Group also operates Australia's leading commercial property website — realcommercial.com.au — as well as the leading website dedicated to share property, Flatmates.com.au.
It also owns property research website, property.com.au, mortgage broking franchise Mortgage Choice, Australian property research group PropTrack, vendor paid advertising provider Campaign Agent, and digital platform Realtair.
Internationally, REA Group also holds several other investments.
Ms Mooney says Realtair is a platform used by many agents that gives REA a wealth of valuable information about home owners.
"In the same way they now require buyers to create a profile account before they can email an enquiry to the agent about a property, there is a warning sign for the amount of data they are collecting across each of the associated businesses they own," she said.
"Add to this ownership of Mortgage Choice — and they essentially hold data and information that allows them to predict who will do what at each stage of their journey."
REA's spokesman told ABC News the company "have no plans to charge for leads".
But one agent from a major franchise in Melbourne's east who spoke off the record (he was worried REA Group would punish him by raising costs if he spoke out against them) said very soon REA could start charging agents for seller leads.
"You already get leads that say, 'would you like to look at this for free, then click here', and you get to see details of the seller for free," he explained.
Another prominent agent in Melbourne's east, who also wanted to speak off record, said: "Speculation they might sell those leads back to agents has been a topic of discussion for about five to 10 years."
Mr Scott also thinks "REA Group will take full advantage of its market position and that may well lead to charging agents for additional leads and listings".
The REINSW's Mr McKibbin says agents are concerned that REA is gaining greater control over the real estate industry through its data collection.
Professor Allan Fels says, while REA may have "close to monopoly power to raise their prices by excessive amounts", price gouging itself is not illegal.
He calls on the ACCC to "run a ruler over REA to make sure there's no unlawful anti competitive behaviour".
"There's also an issue that if a firm has got high market power in one market, for example real estate, it can set itself up to acquire and exploit market power in related markets."
Mr Fels says, after all is said and done, there is a prospect that the ACCC's latest investigation will come to nothing.
Will consumers be left worse off, paying higher prices?
"The great weakness of Domain as a competitor, enables REA to jack up prices to very, very high levels, but it is not unlawful in this country," Fels notes.