Flat five thousand five hundred versus 2.4 percent on a four hundred sixty thousand dollar purchase, for different scopes of work

Two written buyer's agent proposals for the same search are worth laying side by side. Agent A offers 2.4 percent of purchase price, roughly $11,040 on a $460k target, full service, eleven years in the submarket, and the kind of comp work that talks a buyer out of a house they liked. Agent B offers a flat $5,500, payable at closing regardless of price, but the scope excludes showings before narrowing to three properties and excludes repair negotiation beyond the initial objection letter. Writing offers, coordinating inspection, and managing the file to close are included. The spread is $5,540 for the work in that exclusion. For a buyer purchasing an older house with original systems, that is exactly the situation where the exclusion bites hardest, since it is precisely where a buyer with no repair negotiation experience needs the help. The other open question in both proposals is the seller-side commission. On a percentage deal, a seller-side offer matching the buyer agent's rate zeroes out the buyer's obligation. On a flat deal, a seller-side offer above the flat fee leaves a difference, and what happens to that difference needs to be asked directly. One answer, that it stays with the brokerage, and another, that it can be credited back if the contract is written that way and the lender allows it, are very different outcomes, and the second moves a flat fee from cheaper to a lot cheaper. That answer, confirmed in writing, is worth getting before the exclusion becomes the whole question.