How much commission do agents in SA charge?

Rental mandates are the source of a rental agent’s livelihood, it determines the agent’s duties and importantly the commission payable. While rental mandates fall into two common categories: “place the tenant only” or “place the tenant and manage the property”, the commission charged varies widely.

The TPN Commission Survey results are in: rental mandates to “place the tenant only” indicate some agents take home as little as 1% while others comfortably charge 15%.

The commission of rental mandates to “place the tenant and manage the property” are structured either as:

• An upfront placement commission and then monthly management commission; or
• A monthly management commission (which includes the placement commission) and this commission combination kicks off in the single digits at 5.5% pushing up to 27.06%.

As a side note, given the increasing number of tenants who cancel their leases early, the rental agents who charge a placement commission in addition to the monthly management commission are protecting their payment for work performed, as they are able to charge the pro-rata cost of the placement commission onto the tenant for the early cancellation as part of the reasonable penalty to find a replacement tenant.

Click here for the Commission Survey Results for the lows, the highs and the average commission.