A Relocation Company Case Study (Part 2)
In Part 1, we laid out the questions every seller should ask before agreeing to work with a relocation company. Here's the story that prompted those questions.
A longtime family friend was relocating out of state for a new job and their employer had hired a relocation company to handle the move. Even though we knew that the relocation company would require a 40% "referral" from our professional fee, we agreed to take the listing because we wanted to help our people. Here's what that process actually looked like.
Pricing: one number vs. a real strategy
Even though we had a personal relationship with the Sellers, we were still required to interview to become the listing agent. As part of that conversation, the relocation company asked us for a number – the one price we thought the house would sell for. That's not how we normally advise sellers. We prefer to lay out 2–3 pricing strategies with a realistic range, because telling a seller "it will sell for X" oversimplifies a genuinely nuanced decision and can be misleading.
We provided a price, as they asked, along with a fuller explanation of the available strategies. Shortly after, the relocation company followed up in writing asking us to lower the list price by roughly 6% "in order to avoid involving a third brokerage." We held firm and offered a smaller concession instead — about 3.7% below our original recommendation — explaining that going any lower would undervalue the property and leave equity on the table, and that our listing strategy was built to maximize price within a reasonable timeframe.
The relocation company accepted that smaller reduction, and it became a hard ceiling on the list price. That limited the strategies available to our sellers so we ended up marketing the property off-market first, at a higher price the sellers wanted the chance to test.
The inspection that almost disappeared
Early on, the relocation company ordered an inspection on the home. Our sellers were still mid-move, so the house wasn’t decluttered or staged at that point. While an inspector doesn't note tidiness, inspection photos still show the clutter and that quietly shapes how people read everything else in the report.
We asked the relocation company for a copy of that inspection for our files and were told: "We don't have it. We don't want the sellers to have to disclose that."
That response left us stuck. Texas law requires sellers to disclose inspections performed within the last four years, and we couldn't advise full disclosure without the document itself. After going back and forth, we ordered a second inspection ourselves — once the home was prepped and decluttered — so we could present it alongside a list of completed repairs and keep our sellers fully transparent.
We got that second inspection done, listed the home off-market, and received a strong offer. Then, while we were waiting on the relocation company to approve the contract, the original inspection report surfaced from the relo company and was sent directly to our sellers.
Had we not already commissioned our own "after prep" inspection, the only report available would have been the first one that was conducted in a cluttered, mid-move home, with no context for the buyer. Because we had both reports in hand, our buyer wasn't blindsided. However, we ultimately lost that offer. And we think the process, not the house, is a big part of why.
Why the first offer walked away
Part of how we run an off-market sale is by creating a genuine, well-earned sense of urgency: broker tours, targeted outreach, visibility that makes serious buyers feel they need to move quickly if they're interested. It's a careful balance. You get an offer, and if you're fortunate, a second interested party. Then negotiate and sign the first offer within a reasonable window so that the buyer feels secure rather than used as leverage.
We got that first offer on a Saturday. Then the buyer and their agent had to wait until the following Tuesday for the relocation company to approve the contract. In a market where buyers expect same-day or next-day turnaround, several days of silence changed the whole feel of the relationship. The pressure we'd built with a second interested party stopped feeling like momentum and the buyer started feeling as though they had simply paid too much. They terminated.
We ultimately listed the home on the MLS roughly 3.6% below that original off-market price.
We can't say with certainty that the relocation company's delay alone caused the lower final price because there's no clean control group for that. But we can say the timeline friction was real, and a faster approval process would very likely have kept more of that value on the table for the sellers.
The fight over who our client actually was
At one point, the relocation company asked us to remove our sellers from the email thread entirely, on the basis that the seller's employer (not the seller) was "the true client." If you understand where a realtor's fiduciary duty actually sits, that request should stop you in your tracks. It stopped us.
Our listing agreement was with the Sellers and not the relocation company. So we kept forwarding every email. It put us in the position of staying professional with the relocation company while still giving our sellers the direct, unfiltered advice they were owed.
To be fair, we don't think this level of friction is typical of every relocation company. But it does illustrate a structural issue worth understanding before you agree to the service. The incentives of the party managing your sale may not be aligned with getting you the best outcome, especially in a market that isn't red-hot. In 2020–2021, a hot Austin housing market might have absorbed all this friction because buyers were signing almost anything. In a slower market, buyers and their agents have options, and every extra layer of paperwork or delay gives them a reason to hesitate.
Did the relocation company actually save our sellers money?
This is the part worth sitting with. The relocation company told our sellers they were providing coverage of the agent fee on the sale, title fees, and the agent fee on the purchase, which our sellers initially understood as roughly 7% in total benefit.
As a team of data nerds, we, of course, looked closer at the numbers:
The relocation company was only willing to contribute 2% toward the buyer's agent fee on the sale side when the industry standard is typically 3%. To keep the home competitive with others in the neighborhood (where sellers typically offer more), our clients had to make up roughly 1% out of their own net proceeds. Net benefit so far: 6%.
On the purchase side, in the current market, buyers are often already getting seller-paid agent fee contributions, so the "3% benefit" the relocation company advertised on the buy side wasn't really incremental value. Net benefit now: roughly 3%.
Then there's the 41% the relocation company takes off the top of the listing agent's fee. This is a cost that shows up either as reduced service, or as an agent who needed the business badly enough to accept a steep discount. Applying that reduction brings the real value down to somewhere in the neighborhood of 1.8%.
So a benefit our sellers initially understood as 7% looked much closer to 1.8% once we accounted for what was actually being offered versus what the market already provides.
Weigh that estimated 1.8% benefit against the value likely lost to process friction — the stalled first offer, the slower cadence, the extra paperwork. For our sellers, the net outcome looks close to a wash at best, and possibly a net loss.
The takeaway
We don't think every relocation company creates this much friction, and we don't think every situation plays out this way. But the structural incentives are worth understanding clearly before you say yes: the relocation company's client is your employer, not you; the referral fee it charges can push the most in-demand agents out of contention; and in a market that isn't running red-hot, delays and extra paperwork carry a real cost.
As with anything, read the fine print, ask the questions in Part 1, and don't assume a service is free just because someone else is footing part of the bill.
