Macquarie veteran takes on Purplebricks with low-cost Sello launch for Sydney vendors

The former Macquarie Real Estate director Ian MacIntosh has launched a low cost Sydney-based estate agency, Sello.

His co-investors are David Murphy, a Mosman estate agent and tech entrepreneur Craig Hewett, who co-founded online travel marketplace Wego.

Sello's estate agents, who will work remotely, will charge home sellers a fixed $7,550 fee.

MacIntosh acknowledged to the Australian Financial Review that there were similarities with Purplebricks but said Sello's digital platform had been designed specifically to address the "misgivings" of local vendors, these being the high cost of selling, "less than stellar" levels of service and a lack of transparency.

"We want to empower vendors through information so they can interact at a higher level of understanding," he said.

MacIntosh said Sydney vendors faced exorbitant costs.

He said the growth of the hybrid model did not signal the death knell of commission-earning agents "but the emergence of a new sector within a binary marketplace".

Sello has had just the one sale, in Bronte at $935,000.

Prior to founding Sello, Mr Macintosh spent 15 years at Macquarie Bank.

It was in roles spanning real estate funds management, risk management, product development and project management.  

His property roles included managing the Macquarie Office Fund before the platform was sold to Charter Hall in 2010.

The AFR advised agents will earn a undisclosed portion of the $7,550 Sello fee with a payment received when the property is listed and another when it sold.