BuyMyplace offers Purplebricks-style property selling model with fixed fees

Selling your home? From property appraisals to price negotiations, DIY home-selling online platform buyMyplace.com.au promises to cover it all for a maximum of $4,595, saving you thousands in real estate agent fees. 

BuyMyplace, which will launch in Melbourne initially, follows a fixed fee Purplebricks-style operating model, according to an article in the Australian Financial Review.

With a Basic Package starting at $695, the online platform offers several options to sellers. Auctions will cost an additional $895 fee. 

For the full-service package, vendors can avail the services of a dedicated real estate agent.

Paul Heath, chief executive of the ASX-listed company, was cited by AFR as saying that vendors would save more than $15,000 in agent commissions.

He said offering a low-cost, fixed-fee model would complement the existing DIY business and was the "new order and way of doing things".

"Traditional real estate agents, which charge commission, are struggling in a lower-listings environment, while we are growing quickly," he said.

Heath said more vendors were becoming aware that there are other ways to sell their property, either by doing it themselves or through a low-cost offering.

"In the UK, Countrywide, the country's biggest real estate group, are closing 59 branches over the coming months. In Australia, traditional real estate agents are struggling to maintain momentum," he said.

The new business will be led by Melbourne real estate agent Cameron Fisher, who previously ran Changing Places Real Estate, which offered a fixed-fee commission structure.

Fisher said there was not always a significant difference in the effort and resources required to sell a $450,000 property compared with a $950,000 property, "yet the commission received by the traditional real estate agency is significantly higher, often double".

UK estate agent Purplebricks launched in Melbourne and south-east Queensland in September last year with a $4,500 flat fee combined with 24/7 service via an online platform. The company recently expanded its operations to Sydney.

Recently, First National Real Estate chief executive Ray Ellis claimed that Purplebricks' low-cost model had been rejected in Australia and it would only replicate its losses in Britain.