Real estate marketing is two jobs that often get mixed up: marketing listings to buyers, which the portals mostly handle, and marketing the agent to vendors and landlords, which wins the next listing. Most of the opportunity is in the second. And the rules are changing: for agency agreements from 17 November 2026, NSW sale ads must show a price or range, Victoria now requires reserves published before auction, and Queensland bans price guides for auctions.
Written by Dan Picken, founder. Last checked 2 November 2026.Sales from Cotality's housing chart pack (vendor data). Victorian licences and taskforce fines from the CAV annual report 2024-25: 18,694 estate agents and 15,961 agent's representatives, and 48 underquoting infringements. Renters from the AIHW. A big, regulated market where regulators are actively enforcing price rules.
Source: CAV annual report 2024-25
How vendors choose an agent
A seller notices who's selling in their street, asks friends, looks agents up online and checks reviews, then invites two or three for an appraisal and decides on trust, the plan and the fee.
The psychology
Selling a home is a big, emotional decision, and for many sellers choosing the agent is the hardest part.
01
Vendors judge it by what an agent has sold nearby. An older Roy Morgan survey found 58% chose an agent after seeing them sell locally. In another older survey, 57% of sellers called selling one of life's most stressful experiences.
Show them: Recent local sales, with sale method and days on market.
02
A high appraisal anchors expectations, and vendors know it can happen. Price rules now limit how low the advertised price can go.
Show them: How you arrive at an estimate, with comparable sales.
03
Commission and marketing costs feel like money lost, so they loom large.
Show them: How fees and marketing costs work, before the appraisal.
04
Poor communication is a common complaint about agents.
Show them: How often you report, and what each report includes.
05
Underquoting cases and taskforces keep agents in the news.
Show them: Your licence details, reviews and a plain account of the price rules you follow.
From my audits
These are the patterns that come up most in agency marketing, and the first things I'd check.
Paid ads promoting properties the portals already show, and nothing aimed at the next vendor.
Requests from the website and portals, with no record of which became a signed listing.
The same page copied for every suburb, with nothing local in it.
Plenty of reviews, most more than a year old, which looks like an agent past their best.
Ad wording that was fine under the old rules and isn't now.
Price line checker
Pick the state and sale method, enter the agent's estimate and any rejected offer, and the price line from the ad. Checked 2 November 2026. The starting numbers are made up.
Verdict
-
A marketer's check of the numbers and words, not legal advice. Check the state regulator's page before the campaign goes live.
AI search
realestate.com.au launched an app inside ChatGPT in February 2026, so buyers can search listings by asking. Vendors ask AI tools what their home is worth and how to choose an agent. Cotality's research found 42% of Australian buyers had zero tolerance for errors in listing data, so accuracy matters more than ever.
Buyers searching with AI mostly meet portal listings. Agents win on the vendor questions instead.
Suburb pages with real sales and local knowledge give AI tools something specific to quote when someone asks about selling in your area.
What to do now
My take: the portals own the buyer. The agent who explains the local market best owns the vendor, and that's the person who decides who gets the next listing.
Australian rules
Price advertising rules have changed in NSW and Victoria, and Queensland bans auction price guides. These come up most, checked on 2 November 2026.
For agency agreements signed from 17 November 2026, residential sale ads must show a price or price range, not below the estimate, and online ads must be fixed within 1 business day.
For auctions and fixed-date sales from 16 October 2026, the reserve must be published at least 7 days before. Price ranges can be no more than 10% wide.
Agents must not give a price guide for auction properties, and portals show set wording instead.
In NSW, agents can't digitally add or remove features, and off-site photos must be labelled 'location shot'.
NSW, Victoria and Queensland require one fixed rent in rental ads, and NSW ads can't say 'no pets'.
A marketer's summary, not legal advice. The full set, with a campaign deadline calendar, is on the real estate advertising rules page.
The channel mix
The real estate hub
Marketing aimed at the next vendor, not just the current listing: recent local sales that are easy to find, fresh reviews, real suburb pages and fast replies to appraisal requests.
For agency agreements signed from 17 November 2026, residential sale ads must show a price or price range, according to NSW Fair Trading.
Not for auction properties. Queensland bans price guides for auctions.
For auctions and fixed-date sales from 16 October 2026, the reserve must be published at least 7 days before the sale, and the sale price published afterwards.
Meta's housing ad restrictions are required in the US, Canada and Europe, not Australia. Target on where people live and what they're doing, not who they are.
Mostly from people who've seen them sell locally or been referred. An older Roy Morgan survey found 58% of vendors chose an agent after seeing them sell a local property.
Keep going
Takes a minute. Audits come back within 1 to 2 business days. For anything else, I'll get back to you as soon as possible.
What happens next