What a 1% listing fee covers — and what it doesn't

A low fee invites a fair question: what got cut?

The honest answer is that nothing on the service side got cut, and the reason the number works is structural rather than clever. Here is the whole thing, including the parts that are not included.

What is included

Pricing. A comparative market analysis built from actual closings, not asking prices, with a recommendation and the reasoning behind it. You get the comps and you get to argue with them.

Professional photography. Shot before the listing goes live. This is not optional and it is not an upsell.

MLS listing and syndication. Smart MLS, and from there the portals — Zillow, Realtor.com, Homes.com and the rest.

Preparation advice. What to fix, what to leave, and specifically what not to spend money on. Most sellers are talked into at least one renovation that does not return its cost.

Showing coordination. Scheduling, feedback, and managing access so you are not fielding calls.

Offer review and negotiation. Every offer presented with the terms explained — not just the price, but the financing, the contingencies, the closing date and the things that quietly decide whether a deal closes.

Inspection negotiation. This is where sales are lost, and it is the part of the job that most rewards experience.

File management to closing. Coordinating with your attorney, the buyer's side, the lender and the appraiser.

A licensed broker handling it directly. Not handed to an assistant after the listing agreement is signed.

What is not included

Buyer-agent compensation. This is the important one. The 1% is the listing side only. Whether you offer compensation to the agent bringing the buyer, how much, and how it is structured is a separate decision, it is negotiable in every transaction, and it is yours to make. We will give you a straight recommendation based on what is actually happening in your price band, and the decision stays with you.

Anyone quoting a fee without saying this out loud is letting you assume something that is not true.

The $400 transaction fee. Flat, disclosed up front, covers file and compliance processing. It is in the listing agreement in writing.

Staging and repairs. We will tell you what is worth doing and connect you with people who do it. The cost is yours.

Your attorney. Connecticut closings run through attorneys. That is your relationship and your fee.

Conveyance tax, concessions and prorations. Costs of selling, not costs of representation.

Why the number works

Three reasons, none of them involving doing less.

The first is that a listing costs roughly the same to run at $250,000 as at $700,000. Photography, time, coordination, negotiation — the effort does not scale with the price. Percentage-based pricing assumes it does.

The second is volume. We would rather run more listings at a fee sellers do not have to think hard about than fewer at a fee that makes them hesitate.

The third is background. More than a decade of this, much of it on the institutional side of the business where the work is valuation, condition assessment and disposition under deadline. That work makes you fast at the parts of a residential sale that cost other people time.

The arithmetic

On a $400,000 sale:

Buyer-agent compensation sits outside this table for both columns, because it is a separate negotiation either way.

$5,600 is not a rounding error. It is most of a kitchen, or the entire gap between the offer you got and the offer you wanted.

If you want to see what this looks like on your specific property, we will run the numbers. No obligation to list.

Zack DeCaro is a licensed real estate broker in Connecticut and Massachusetts and an agent in Rhode Island, New York and Florida, with Property Works New England in Rocky Hill. All commissions are negotiable.