What is the difference between a sole agency and a general listing in New Zealand?

A sole agency gives one agency the exclusive right to market and sell your property for a fixed term. A general agency, often called a general listing or multiple representation, lets more than one agency market the property at the same time, and you sign a separate agreement with each one. Under the Real Estate Authority standard clauses, a residential sole agency runs for 90 days if no end date is written in, while a general agency continues until either party gives seven days written notice.

Can I be charged two commissions on a general listing?

Yes, that is the real risk. The Real Estate Authority is explicit that if you sign more than one agency agreement you may have to pay all agents a commission regardless of which one arranges the sale. The dispute usually turns on who introduced the buyer, because two salespeople can both have shown the same buyer through. Using the REA approved standard clauses reduces the chance of a double claim but does not remove it, so on a $770,000 sale at a tiered 3.95% and 2% structure the extra exposure is a further $24,437.50 including GST.

How long does a sole agency agreement last in New Zealand?

The term is whatever the agreement says. Under the REA standard residential clauses, if no end date is filled in the sole agency runs for 90 days from the commencement date. Terms of 60 to 90 days are common. Where a residential sole agency is written for longer than 90 days, section 130 related protections and the standard clauses let either party cancel by written notice at any time after the first 90 days.

Can I cancel a sole agency agreement after I have signed it?

Section 130 of the Real Estate Agents Act 2008 gives you a short statutory cooling-off right. A client who is party to a sole agency agreement may cancel it by written notice by 5pm on the first working day after the day a copy of the agreement is given to them. Notice may be given by email. That right applies despite anything to the contrary in the agreement. After that window closes you are into the agreed term, and if the agent has already done work that results in a sale you can still owe commission.

What is the continuing commission or tail clause?

It is the clause that keeps an agency entitled to commission after the agreement has ended. Under the REA standard residential clauses, commission remains payable if within six months of the expiry, cancellation or termination of the agency you sell privately to a buyer the agency introduced, or where the sale comes about through the agency's efforts. For rural agency agreements the standard stand-down period is twelve months. When an agreement ends the agency must give you a list of the people it introduced to the property, and that list is the practical record of who the tail applies to.

Does a general listing sell a house faster or for more money?

There is no reliable New Zealand evidence that it does, and there are structural reasons to expect the opposite. An agency that knows it might do all the work and earn nothing has less reason to spend its own money and time on your property, and buyers who see the same house listed by three agencies can read it as a sign of a stale or difficult listing. The REINZ median days to sell nationally was 48 days in June 2026, so a 90 day sole agency term already covers a typical marketing campaign with room to spare.

Do I pay for marketing twice on a general listing?

Usually yes, at least in part. Marketing and advertising are charged separately from commission by every agency, and typically range from about $1,000 to $10,000 or more depending on the campaign. Each agency on a general listing will normally want its own photography, signage, portal listings and print, and each will invoice you for it whether or not the property sells. That duplicated marketing is the certain cost of a general listing, as opposed to the double commission which is the risk.

Sole Agency vs General Listing Calculator

Quick answer: A sole agency gives one agency the exclusive right to sell your property for a fixed term, normally 90 days under the Real Estate Authority standard clauses. A general listing lets several agencies market it at once. The commission rate is usually the same either way, so a general listing does not make the fee cheaper. What it does is add cost and risk: you pay a separate marketing bill to each agency, and if two agencies both claim to have introduced the buyer you can be liable for two commissions. On a $770,000 sale at a tiered 3.95% and 2% structure, that second commission is a further $26,680.00 including GST. Enter your own numbers below.

This calculator compares the two agency agreement types a New Zealand seller has to choose between, and it is a risk tool as much as a cost tool. Enter your expected sale price, pick the agency you are dealing with or type in the rate you have been quoted, then set the marketing spend and how many agencies you would list with. The calculator shows three figures side by side: what a sole agency costs, what a general listing costs when everything goes to plan and only one agency claims the commission, and the worst case where two agencies both claim to have introduced the buyer and you are exposed to two full commissions. Commission in New Zealand is quoted exclusive of GST and marketing is charged separately, so every figure is shown both ways and 15% GST is added before the totals are compared. The page also sets out the terms that catch sellers out: the continuing commission tail that lets an agency claim its fee for six months after the agreement ends, the statutory right to cancel a sole agency by 5pm on the first working day after you are given a copy, and the seven days written notice that ends a general agency. Every agency structure is read from one maintained file and carries a source flag, because ten of the twelve are indicative rather than published rate cards.

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Updated July 2026 Current rates and legislation applied.

Verification & Methodology

Commission structures: read from one maintained file shared with our Real Estate Commission Calculator and every individual agency page, so the same agency always produces the same figure across the site. Last researched June 2026.
Source flags: published means the agency's own rate card, site means the agency's website or fee page, and indicative means a typical New Zealand structure used as a placeholder that must be verified. Ten of the twelve structures are indicative. The flag for your current selection is shown under the dropdown.
GST: commission and marketing are quoted exclusive of GST. This calculator adds 15% GST, per the Goods and Services Tax Act 1985.
Marketing: Marketing and advertising are charged separately and typically range from about $1,000 to $10,000 or more depending on the campaign. It is an editable estimate on this page, defaulting to $3,000 per agency, and is charged whether or not the property sells.
Sole agency term: under the REA standard clauses for residential agency agreements, a sole agency runs to the end date written in, or 90 days from the commencement date if no end date is given.
General agency notice: the REA standard general agency clause is cancellable by either party giving seven days written notice.
Cooling off: Section 130 of the Real Estate Agents Act 2008 lets a client cancel a sole agency agreement by written notice by 5pm on the first working day after a copy is given to them.
Continuing commission tail: six months for residential and twelve months for rural under the REA standard clauses, running from the expiry, cancellation or termination of the agency, where the sale is to a buyer the agency introduced.
Legal advice: Rule 9.7 of the Real Estate Agents Act (Professional Conduct and Client Care) Rules 2012 requires a licensee to recommend you seek legal advice before you sign an agency agreement and to allow you a reasonable opportunity to obtain it. Section 127 of the Act requires the approved guide to be given to you first, and section 126 means no written agency agreement, no entitlement to commission.
Market context: the worked example uses the REINZ national median sale price of $770,000 and median days to sell of 48 days for June 2026, from the REINZ Monthly Property Report released 15 July 2026.
Negotiability: all New Zealand real estate commission is negotiable and varies by office, region and property type. Figures here are indicative estimates, not a quote, and not legal or financial advice.

Expected Sale Price

Defaults to the REINZ national median sale price for June 2026.

Agency Fee Structure

Commission Rate on the Whole Price

Minimum Fee (excluding GST)

Marketing Spend Per Agency (excluding GST)

Editable estimate. Marketing is charged separately from commission and is payable whether or not the property sells.

Agencies on the General Listing

A sole agency is always one agency. This setting only affects the general listing side.

Sole agency

$30,130.00

General listing, one commission

$33,580.00

General listing, worst case

$60,260.00

Full cost breakdown

Every figure below is for the same sale price and the same commission rate. The only things that change are how many marketing campaigns you pay for and how many agencies end up with a commission claim.

Cost line	Sole agency	General listing	General listing, worst case

Commission and marketing are both quoted exclusive of GST and 15% GST is added before the totals are compared. The general listing column assumes only one agency ends up with a valid commission claim, which is the intended outcome. The worst-case column assumes all 2 of them do. Legal fees, moving costs and any conjunctional split between agencies are not included.

What to do next: Take the draft agency agreement to your lawyer before you sign it, not after, and ask them to check four things specifically: the exact end date of the term, the length of the continuing commission tail, how the agreement is cancelled and in what form, and whether a cancelled sole agency automatically converts into a general agency. Your agent is required by Rule 9.7 to recommend that legal advice and to give you a reasonable opportunity to get it, so asking for a day or two is normal and expected. If the sale is funding your next purchase, book a conversation with a mortgage adviser in the same week, because your bridging position, the deposit released on settlement and any break cost on your current fixed rate will usually move more money than the fee terms you are negotiating here.

Worked Example: A $770,000 Sale With Two Agencies

Take a seller in Auckland with a $770,000 appraisal, which is the REINZ national median sale price for June 2026, listing with Barfoot & Thompson on their published tiered structure of 3.95% on the first $400,000 then 2% on the balance, with a $11,000 minimum, all plus GST. The first tier produces $15,800.00, and 2% of the remaining $370,000 produces $7,400.00. That is $23,200.00 of commission, comfortably clear of the minimum, and GST of $3,480.00 brings it to $26,680.00.

Under a sole agency the seller pays that once, plus one marketing campaign of $3,000. With GST on both, the total cost of selling is $30,130.00. Now list the same property with 2 agencies on a general listing. The commission rate does not change, so if everything goes to plan and only one agency claims, the commission is still $26,680.00. But the seller now has two marketing bills of $3,000 each, which takes the total to $33,580.00. The general listing is $3,450.00 more expensive before anything has even gone wrong.

Then consider the case the whole decision actually turns on. Both salespeople showed the buyer through, one at a Saturday open home and one at a private viewing, and both now claim to have introduced them. If both claims succeed the seller owes $23,200.00 twice, which is $46,400.00 plus GST, and the total cost of selling becomes $60,260.00. That is an extra $26,680.00 including GST, or 3.46% of the sale price, on top of everything else. It is not the likely outcome, but it is the outcome you are underwriting when you sign the second agreement, and it is not insured, capped or shared with anyone.

What a Sole Agency Actually Commits You To

A sole agency gives one agency the exclusive right to market and sell the property for the term written into the agreement. Under the Real Estate Authority standard clauses for residential agency agreements, if no end date is filled in the sole agency runs for 90 days from the commencement date, and terms of 60 to 90 days are the norm. During that term the agency earns the commission on a sale even if the buyer came from somewhere else, which is exactly what buys you the agency's commitment. Because it knows it will be paid if the property sells, it has every reason to put real money and real hours into the campaign, brief the whole office, work its buyer database and run the auction or tender process properly. That certainty is the product you are buying. Given the REINZ median days to sell nationally was 48 days in June 2026, a 90 day term normally covers a full campaign with time to spare.

Where the Double Commission Claim Comes From

The Real Estate Authority puts it plainly: if you sign more than one agency agreement you may have to pay all agents a commission, regardless of which one arranges a sale. The mechanism is the effective cause of sale, usually expressed as which agency introduced the buyer. That sounds like a question with one answer, and often it is, but on a busy general listing it is not. A buyer walks through a Saturday open home run by agency A, does nothing, then two weeks later rings agency B about the same house after seeing its sign, and buys. Both agencies have a plausible claim. Agency A has an attendance record with the buyer's name on it, and agency B wrote the offer. Neither agency will simply drop it, because the commission is the whole of its return on the campaign, and you are the only party in the transaction with an interest in the answer being singular. The REA approved standard clauses are designed to reduce exactly this outcome by making it clear when an agreement ends and when commission becomes payable, and they are worth insisting on, but they narrow the risk rather than removing it.

The Continuing Commission Tail After the Agreement Ends

The clause sellers are most often surprised by is the one that survives the agreement. Under the REA standard residential clauses, commission is still payable if within six months of the expiry, cancellation or termination of the agency you enter into a private agreement to sell the property to a buyer the agency introduced, or where the sale otherwise comes about through the agency's efforts. For rural agency agreements the standard stand-down period is twelve months. This is why, when an agency agreement ends, the agency must give you a written list of the people it introduced to the property. Treat that list as the single most important document in the whole process. It is the record of who the tail applies to, and it is the list your next agent needs to see so that a buyer is not accidentally sold to twice over. The tail is also the reason a general listing keeps producing risk after you have walked away from one of the agencies: cancelling agency A does not cancel its claim over the buyers agency A introduced while it was on.

Cancelling Each Type of Agreement

Section 130 of the Real Estate Agents Act 2008 gives you a genuine cooling-off right on a sole agency, and it is short. You may cancel by written notice by 5pm on the first working day after the day a copy of the agreement is given to you, notice may be given by email, and that right applies despite anything in the agreement that says otherwise. If work already done by the agent results in a sale, you can still owe commission on it. After that window the term binds you. Where a residential sole agency has been written for longer than 90 days, either party may cancel it in writing at any time after the first 90 days. A general agency under the REA standard clauses is cancellable by either party giving seven days written notice, which is the one genuine flexibility advantage the general listing has. One trap to watch for is that some sole agency agreements automatically convert into a general agency when the sole agency is cancelled, which means you have to cancel twice to be properly free of the agency. Ask whether yours does that before you sign.

Get the Agreement Checked Before You Sign

Rule 9.7 of the Real Estate Agents Act (Professional Conduct and Client Care) Rules 2012 requires a licensee, before you sign an agency agreement, to recommend that you seek legal advice, ensure you are aware you can and may need to seek technical or other advice, and allow you a reasonable opportunity to obtain it. Section 127 of the Act requires the agent to give you the approved guide before a residential agency agreement is signed, and section 126 means that without a written agency agreement the agent has no entitlement to commission or expenses at all. Taken together these are not formalities. They exist because the agency agreement is the document that decides how much you pay, for how long you are committed, and who can still come back at you after it ends. A lawyer will read it in fifteen minutes for a fee that is trivial against the numbers on this page.

Who This Calculator Is For

It is for anyone about to sign an agency agreement in New Zealand and weighing up whether to give one agency exclusivity or spread the listing across several. It is particularly useful if an agent has told you a general listing costs nothing extra, because the marketing duplication alone usually disproves that. It also helps if you are already on a sole agency and thinking about cancelling, because the tail figures show what stays live after you leave.

What This Calculator Assumes

The same commission rate applies whichever agreement type you choose. Agencies do not usually discount for a general listing, and if yours does, enter the discounted rate as a custom rate.
All commission and marketing figures are quoted exclusive of GST, with 15% GST added before the totals are compared.
Marketing is charged per agency on a general listing, because each agency normally runs its own campaign. Enter $0 if you have a written agreement that you will not be charged.
The worst case assumes every agency on the listing successfully claims a full commission. That is the upper bound of your exposure, not a prediction.
Structures flagged as indicative are a typical New Zealand structure, not a published rate card, and must be verified with the agency.
Where a fixed-fee agency publishes bands up to a ceiling, prices above that ceiling are reported as negotiated rather than estimated.
Legal costs, the continuing commission tail on a later private sale, and any conjunctional arrangement between agencies are outside these figures. This is an estimate, not a quote, and not legal advice.

Related NZ Property Selling Calculators

Real Estate Commission Calculator: all twelve agency structures compared at one sale price, ranked by total fee including GST.
Flat Fee vs Commission Calculator: the break-even sale price where a fixed fee starts beating a percentage commission.
Commission Negotiation Savings Calculator: what a negotiated rate reduction is actually worth in dollars.
Cost of Selling a House Calculator: commission, marketing, legal fees and moving costs in one total.
Net Sale Proceeds Calculator: what actually lands in your account on settlement after the mortgage and the fees.

Official NZ sources

This calculator is built from New Zealand legislation and Real Estate Authority guidance. Always confirm the terms of your own agency agreement with your lawyer before you sign it:

Real Estate Agents Act 2008, section 130: client may cancel a sole agency agreement by 5pm the next working day
Real Estate Authority (REA): standard clauses for residential and rural agency agreements, including the stand-down period
Real Estate Authority (REA): settled.govt.nz guidance on signing an agency agreement
Real Estate Authority (REA): multiple representation versus sole agency and the risk of paying two commissions

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