IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/reesec/v51y2023i1p130-169.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Conflicts of interest and agent heterogeneity in buyer brokerage

Author

Listed:
  • Lawrence Kryzanowski
  • Yanting Wu
  • Tingyu Zhou

Abstract

This article investigates the incentives of agents working with buyers (buying agents) under the fixed percentage commission system and the implications on housing market outcomes. Our model shows that the absence of a binding contract creates a risk of losing clients for buying agents, which helps mitigate the conflict of interest between buying agents and their clients. Both the buying agent's prediction accuracy regarding their client's reservation prices and the level of tolerance given by the buyer to the buying agent affect the binding force. Results from simulations and empirical analyses using house transactions in Canada support our model predictions.

Suggested Citation

  • Lawrence Kryzanowski & Yanting Wu & Tingyu Zhou, 2023. "Conflicts of interest and agent heterogeneity in buyer brokerage," Real Estate Economics, American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association, vol. 51(1), pages 130-169, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:reesec:v:51:y:2023:i:1:p:130-169
    DOI: 10.1111/1540-6229.12417
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/1540-6229.12417
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/1540-6229.12417?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Steven D. Levitt & Chad Syverson, 2008. "Market Distortions When Agents Are Better Informed: The Value of Information in Real Estate Transactions," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 90(4), pages 599-611, November.
    2. Williams, Joseph T, 1998. "Agency and Brokerage of Real Assets in Competitive Equilibrium," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 11(2), pages 239-280.
    3. Espen R Moen & Plamen T Nenov & Florian Sniekers, 2021. "Buying First or Selling First in Housing Markets," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 19(1), pages 38-81.
    4. Bennie D. Waller & Raymond T. Brastow, 2013. "Dual Agency Representation: Incentive Conflicts or Efficiencies," Journal of Real Estate Research, American Real Estate Society, vol. 35(2), pages 83-102.
    5. Bar-Isaac, Heski & Gavazza, Alessandro, 2015. "Brokers’ contractual arrangements in the Manhattan residential rental market," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(C), pages 73-82.
    6. Vrinda Kadiyali & Jeffrey Prince & Daniel Simon, 2014. "Is Dual Agency in Real Estate a Cause for Concern?," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 48(1), pages 164-195, January.
    7. J’Noel Gardiner & Jeffrey Heisler & Jarl Kallberg & Crocker Liu, 2007. "The Impact of Dual Agency," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 35(1), pages 39-55, July.
    8. Han, Lu & Strange, William C., 2016. "What is the role of the asking price for a house?," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 115-130.
    9. Emily Oster, 2019. "Unobservable Selection and Coefficient Stability: Theory and Evidence," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 37(2), pages 187-204, April.
    10. Darren K. Hayunga & Henry J. Munneke, 2021. "Examining Both Sides of the Transaction: Bargaining in the Housing Market," Real Estate Economics, American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association, vol. 49(2), pages 663-691, June.
    11. Williams, Joseph, 2018. "Housing markets with endogenous search: Theory and implications," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 105(C), pages 107-120.
    12. Rutherford, R.C. & Springer, T.M. & Yavas, A., 2005. "Conflicts between principals and agents: evidence from residential brokerage," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(3), pages 627-665, June.
    13. Adams, Renée & Almeida, Heitor & Ferreira, Daniel, 2009. "Understanding the relationship between founder-CEOs and firm performance," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 16(1), pages 136-150, January.
    14. Anglin, Paul M & Rutherford, Ronald & Springer, Thomas M, 2003. "The Trade-Off Between the Selling Price of Residential Properties and Time-on-the-Market: The Impact of Price Setting," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 26(1), pages 95-111, January.
    15. Bucchianeri, Grace W. & Minson, Julia A., 2013. "A homeowner's dilemma: Anchoring in residential real estate transactions," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 89(C), pages 76-92.
    16. Nicolas L. Bottan & Ricardo Perez-Truglia, 2020. "Betting on the House: Subjective Expectations and Market Choices," NBER Working Papers 27412, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    17. Lu Han & William C. Strange, 2014. "Bidding Wars for Houses," Real Estate Economics, American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association, vol. 42(1), pages 1-32, March.
    18. Geoffrey Turnbull & Jonathan Dombrow, 2006. "Spatial Competition and Shopping Externalities: Evidence from the Housing Market," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 32(4), pages 391-408, June.
    19. Turnbull, Geoffrey K. & Waller, Bennie D., 2018. "(What) do top performing real estate agents deliver for their clients?," Journal of Housing Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 142-152.
    20. Haurin, Donald & McGreal, Stanley & Adair, Alastair & Brown, Louise & Webb, James R., 2013. "List price and sales prices of residential properties during booms and busts," Journal of Housing Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(1), pages 1-10.
    21. Yavas, Abdullah & Colwell, Peter, 1999. "Buyer Brokerage: Incentive and Efficiency Implications," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 18(3), pages 259-277, May.
    22. Ken H. Johnson & Zhenguo Lin & Jia Xie, 2015. "Dual Agent Distortions in Real Estate Transactions," Real Estate Economics, American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association, vol. 43(2), pages 507-536, June.
    23. Han, Lu & Strange, William C., 2015. "The Microstructure of Housing Markets," Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, in: Gilles Duranton & J. V. Henderson & William C. Strange (ed.), Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, edition 1, volume 5, chapter 0, pages 813-886, Elsevier.
    24. Heckman, James, 2013. "Sample selection bias as a specification error," Applied Econometrics, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), vol. 31(3), pages 129-137.
    25. Donald Haurin, 1988. "The Duration of Marketing Time of Residential Housing," Real Estate Economics, American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association, vol. 16(4), pages 396-410, December.
    26. Agarwal, Sumit & He, Jia & Sing, Tien Foo & Song, Changcheng, 2019. "Do real estate agents have information advantages in housing markets?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 134(3), pages 715-735.
    27. Andrey Pavlov & Tsur Somerville, 2020. "Immigration, Capital Flows and Housing Prices," Real Estate Economics, American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association, vol. 48(3), pages 915-949, September.
    28. Michel Glower & Donald R. Haurin & Patric H. Hendershott, 1998. "Selling Time and Selling Price: The Influence of Seller Motivation," Real Estate Economics, American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association, vol. 26(4), pages 719-740, December.
    29. Sahin, M. Abdullah & Sirmans, C.F. & Yavas, Abdullah, 2013. "Buyer brokerage: Experimental evidence," Journal of Housing Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(4), pages 265-277.
    30. Panle Jia Barwick & Parag A. Pathak & Maisy Wong, 2017. "Conflicts of Interest and Steering in Residential Brokerage," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 9(3), pages 191-222, July.
    31. Geoffrey K. Turnbull & Bennie D. Waller & Scott A. Wentland, 2022. "Mitigating agency costs in the housing market," Real Estate Economics, American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association, vol. 50(3), pages 829-861, September.
    32. Sumit Agarwal & Hyun-Soo Choi & Jia He & Tien Foo Sing, 2019. "Matching in Housing Markets: The Role of Ethnic Social Networks," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 32(10), pages 3958-4004.
    33. Elliot Anenberg & Patrick Bayer, 2020. "Endogenous Sources Of Volatility In Housing Markets: The Joint Buyer–Seller Problem," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 61(3), pages 1195-1228, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Han, Lu & Strange, William C., 2015. "The Microstructure of Housing Markets," Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, in: Gilles Duranton & J. V. Henderson & William C. Strange (ed.), Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, edition 1, volume 5, chapter 0, pages 813-886, Elsevier.
    2. Lin, Zhenguo & Liu, Yingchun & Xie, Jia, 2024. "Market distortions with collusion of agents," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 162(C).
    3. Luis A. Lopez, 2024. "Is there a Principal-Agency Problem with Real Estate Agents in Rental Markets?," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 69(1), pages 29-69, July.
    4. Daniel Broxterman & Tingyu Zhou, 2023. "Information Frictions in Real Estate Markets: Recent Evidence and Issues," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 66(2), pages 203-298, February.
    5. Velma Zahirovic-Herbert & Bennie D. Waller & Geoffrey K. Turnbull, 2020. "Properties that Sell at or above Listing Price: Strategic Pricing, Better Broker or Just Dumb Luck?," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 60(1), pages 53-76, February.
    6. Xun Bian & Justin C. Contat & Bennie D. Waller & Scott A. Wentland, 2023. "Why Disclose Less Information? Toward Resolving a Disclosure Puzzle in the Housing Market," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 66(2), pages 443-486, February.
    7. Han, Lu & Strange, William C., 2016. "What is the role of the asking price for a house?," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 115-130.
    8. Geoffrey K. Turnbull & Bennie D. Waller & Scott A. Wentland, 2022. "Mitigating agency costs in the housing market," Real Estate Economics, American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association, vol. 50(3), pages 829-861, September.
    9. Justin Benefield & Ronald Rutherford & Marcus Allen, 2012. "The Effects of Estate Sales of Residential Real Estate on Price and Marketing Time," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 45(4), pages 965-981, November.
    10. Darren K. Hayunga & R. Kelley Pace, 2017. "List Prices in the US Housing Market," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 55(2), pages 155-184, August.
    11. Tingyu Zhou & John M Clapp & Ran Lu‐Andrews, 2022. "Examining omitted variable bias in anchoring premium estimates: Evidence based on assessed value," Real Estate Economics, American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association, vol. 50(3), pages 789-828, September.
    12. Ralph B. Siebert & Michael J. Seiler, 2022. "Why Do Buyers Pay Different Prices for Comparable Products? A Structural Approach on the Housing Market," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 65(2), pages 261-292, August.
    13. Bian, Xun & Waller, Bennie D. & Turnbull, Geoffrey K. & Wentland, Scott A., 2015. "How many listings are too many? Agent inventory externalities and the residential housing market," Journal of Housing Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(C), pages 130-143.
    14. Luis Arturo Lopez, 2021. "Asymmetric information and personal affiliations in brokered housing transactions," Real Estate Economics, American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association, vol. 49(2), pages 459-492, June.
    15. Chris Cunningham & Kristopher Gerardi & Lily Shen, 2022. "The Good, the Bad, and the Ordinary: Estimating Agent Value-Added Using Real Estate Transactions," FRB Atlanta Working Paper 2022-11, Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta.
    16. Lawrence Kryzanowski & Yanting Wu, 2023. "Signaling effects of recurrent list‐price reductions on the likelihood of house sales," Journal of Financial Research, Southern Finance Association;Southwestern Finance Association, vol. 46(1), pages 99-130, February.
    17. William N Goetzmann & Christophe Spaenjers & Stijn Van Nieuwerburgh, 2021. "Real and Private-Value Assets [Gendered prices]," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 34(8), pages 3497-3526.
    18. Seung‐Hyun Hong, 2022. "Real estate agents' influence on housing search," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 37(3), pages 563-582, April.
    19. Lu Han & William C. Strange, 2014. "Bidding Wars for Houses," Real Estate Economics, American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association, vol. 42(1), pages 1-32, March.
    20. Josep Maria Raya Vilchez & Aleksander Kucel, 2023. "How fiscal policy affects housing market dynamics: Evidence from Spain," Bulletin of Economic Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 75(2), pages 323-347, April.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:reesec:v:51:y:2023:i:1:p:130-169. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/areueea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.