[HN Gopher] New York City Council Votes to End Broker Fees Squee...
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New York City Council Votes to End Broker Fees Squeezing Renters
Author : JumpCrisscross
Score : 24 points
Date : 2024-11-13 21:38 UTC (1 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.bloomberg.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.bloomberg.com)
| tdeck wrote:
| https://archive.is/jyNpm
| tdeck wrote:
| > real estate agents who exclusively represent the landlord's
| interests wouldn't be able to seek a fee from the person signing
| the lease.
|
| I'm curious if this will be creatively interpreted so that the
| broker is mandatory but supposedly represents the interests of
| both LL and tenant, so the tenant has to pay anyway.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _curious if this will be creatively interpreted so that the
| broker is mandatory but supposedly represents the interests of
| both LL and tenant, so the tenant has to pay anyway_
|
| The problem with the old system was I was paying a guy who
| didn't have any obligation to me. Dual obligations means the
| broker can at least be sued for a conflict of interest if they
| hide something or don't do their job. It's a step in the right
| direction.
| GenerWork wrote:
| While I do agree with the spirit of this, doesn't this mean that
| any fees that brokers require will be included in the rent?
| ForHackernews wrote:
| Landlords can shop around and brokers will have to compete on
| price. A potential renter has no ability to pick a different
| broker.
| anotherhue wrote:
| Great, now bring back the congestion fee and we can say we live
| in a better city than we did last year.
| el_benhameen wrote:
| https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/13/nyregion/congestion-prici...
|
| As you requested.
| 535188B17C93743 wrote:
| Didn't they do this before and brokers found a way around it?
| beisner wrote:
| This is a win for price competition - the "broker fee" paid by
| the renter is a classic example of principal agent problems /
| information asymmetry.
|
| First, the service is being provided to the landlord (listing,
| tours, etc.), not the client, for all listings these days (I
| don't know any young person who has ever used a renter's agent,
| except maybe if it's provided in a relocation package). The
| renter has no choice in which broker to use to find/transact w/
| the property, so there's very little price pressure for these
| broker fees.
|
| Second the information asymmetry - the terms of the fee are
| completely opaque in the listings, and are not disclosed
| basically until signing unless you press brokers earlier. So
| there's basically no competitive pressure pushing these fees
| down, since it's basically a "junk fee" from a user experience
| perspective tacked on at the very end (and not listed on
| listings), and the landlord - who IS in a position to negotiate
| on price - doesn't care.
|
| I don't buy the argument that there will be some long-term price
| hike in rents as a result of this decision - people who rent for
| 1-5 years already are paying a MASSIVE "net effective" premium
| for having an additional month's rent tacked on up front - but
| also it strongly incentivizes tenant retention (e.g. by being
| more responsive, keeping prices lower, etc.), because the
| landlord does not want to have to eat a broker's fee next
| listing.
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(page generated 2024-11-13 23:00 UTC)