Compare Opendoor Brokerage and UpNest

For Sellers

Opendoor Agent Partners
30%-40%
Referral Fee
Opendoor Brokerage does not provide real estate services to home sellers. Instead, this broker matches consumers with various real estate agents in exchange for an undisclosed referral fee. Referral fees set by such networks range anywhere between 30%-40% of the entire agent’s commission.

For Sellers

Referred Agents
30%
Referral Fee
UpNest does not provide real estate services to home sellers. Instead, this company matches consumers with various real estate agents in exchange for a 30% referral fee. UpNest results suffer from pay-to-play bias because the network does not match consumers with agents unwilling to pay 30% of their commission to UpNest.

For Buyers

Opendoor Agent Partners
30%-40%
Referral Fee
Opendoor Brokerage does not provide real estate services to home buyers. Instead, this company matches consumers with various real estate agents in exchange for an undisclosed referral fee. Referral fees set by such networks range anywhere between 30%-40% of the entire agent’s commission.

For Buyers

Referred Agents
30%
Referral Fee
UpNest does not provide real estate services to home buyers. Instead, this company matches consumers with various real estate agents in exchange for a 30% referral fee. UpNest results suffer from pay-to-play bias because the network does not match consumers with agents unwilling to pay 30% of their commission to UpNest.
Question: What is the difference between Opendoor Brokerage and UpNest?
Answer: Both Opendoor Brokerage and UpNest function as a referral fee network that enables broker-to-broker collusion with use of blanket referral agreements.
Compare Opendoor Brokerage and UpNest for home buying and selling. HomeOpenly is an impartial and an open resource focused on trending real estate services, portals and start-ups.

First published: 08 July 2019
Last updated: 25 April 2021

Buying and Selling with Opendoor Brokerage

WARNING: Unlawful Kickbacks, Broker-to-Broker Collusion, False Marketing, Wire Fraud, Price Fixing.

Opendoor Brokerage is a broker-to-broker collusion scheme, where "partner agents" unlawfully agree to pay massive kickbacks to receive your information and engage in market allocation, consumer allocation, false advertising, unlawful kickbacks, wire fraud, and price-fixing practices in violation of, inter alia, 18 U.S.C. § 1346, 18 U.S.C. § 1343, 15 U.S.C. § 1, 15 U.S.C. § 45, 12 U.S.C. § 2607, 12 C.F.R. § 1024.14. As a consumer, you will always significantly overpay for Realtor commissions subject to hidden kickbacks and pay-to-play steering promoted in this scheme.

United States federal antitrust laws prohibit consumer allocation and blanket referral agreements between real estate companies.

Be smart; do not allow your information to be "sold as a lead" to a double-dealing Realtor in exchange for massive commission kickbacks paid from your future home sale, or your future home purchase.


Opendoor is a multi-state VC-backed real estate investor that operates across highly specific locations. Where available, Opendoor offers cash to sellers for homogeneous homes built after 1960 with a value between $125,000 and $500,000. Opendoor is the parent company of several real estate brokerages, including Opendoor Brokerage Inc., Opendoor Brokerage LLC, and Opendoor Texas Brokerage LLC (the “Opendoor Brokerages”).

Opendoor Brokerage is a referral fee network designed to collect fees by matching consumers with local real estate agents willing to pay it. Opendoor Brokerage operates as a licensed real estate brokerage in California under BRE License 02061130, and Texas under TREC License 9008105, but neither broker produce any services that are typically offered by real estate agents and does not represent consumers when buying or selling real estate in any State.

When consumers submit information to Opendoor Brokerage, this information is simply sold in exchange for an undisclosed fee with real estate agents in a process known as a “blind match.”

Opendoor Brokerage Pricing

Opendoor Brokerage revenue comes from undisclosed referral fees. Referral fees set by such networks range anywhere between 30%-40% of the entire agent’s commission. According to the company, "Opendoor Agent Partners only pay a referral fee to our brokerage if they close on a transaction with a referred seller or buyer. The fee is a percentage of the agent's commission, and averages 1% of property sale price unless otherwise noted in agent partner agreement."

Listing Services

  • This Service Does Not Represent Sellers

Buyer's Agent Services

  • This Service Does Not Represent Buyers

Opendoor Brokerage Editor's Review:

Using its website, Opendoor Brokerage engages in a process known as price fixing because it sets rebates for independent real estate professionals using the network.

Opendoor Brokerage refers consumers to third-party agents that can represent them in home purchase or sale (“Opendoor Partner Agent”) and requires buyer’s agents to offer certain discounts or promotions contingent upon working with the referred consumers.

Opendoor Brokerage receives a referral fee, around 1% of the home price, likely 30%-40% of Partner Agent's entire commission when referring consumers to list or buy a home with an Opendoor Partner Agent. Opendoor Brokerage requires Opendoor Partner Agents to offer 1% of the purchase price to buyers at closing in the form of a commission rebate. The amount is subject to a minimum buyer’s agent commission to Opendoor Partner Agents of $3,000, which means it is calculated as the lesser of either 1% of the price of the property consumer buys, or Opendoor Partner Agent’s commission minus $3,000. According to Opendoor Brokerage, this amount may be prohibited or reduced on the basis of the purchase type (e.g., short sale), lender requirements, loan type (e.g. FHA, VA), or the law.

For purposes of the present discussion, brokerage fees are always negotiable and no broker should set rates and rebates for other brokers. Each firm should establish its own policy as to its fee structure and charges, amount of commissions, and rebates.

"Agent Partners only pay a referral fee to our brokerage if they close on a transaction with a referred seller or buyer. The fee is a percentage of the agent’s commission, and averages 1% of property sale price unless otherwise noted in agent partner agreement. Opendoor Agent Partners are eligible to receive both buyer and seller referrals. Actual volume by referral type may vary over time. The Opendoor Agent Partner program is a broker-to-broker client referral partnership and is supplemental to your existing brokerage affiliation." Source: Opendoor Brokerage website.

By setting buyer's rebates for other brokers across many regions in the United States, Opendoor Brokerage operates with a sole purpose to collect referral fees, where such service effectively results in lower quality of service, pay-to-play bias, and a "blind match" with agents willing to participate.

With Opendoor Brokerage consumers have zero control over what agents the company shares their information with. Opendoor Brokerage simply subjects a real estate transaction with an additional referral fee that is equal to 1% of the home price. This fee is paid directly by the Opendoor Agent Partner to Opendoor Brokerage for failing to deliver a seamless consumer selling experience. Remember, Opendoor claims to offer consumers to buy homes directly as a revolutionary approach to home selling, instead, it systematically sells inquiries that it is unable to meet to random Opendoor Agent Partners for a fee.

Consumers can expect to significantly overpay for the transaction in the form of a higher commission with Opendoor Agent Partners. Even after consumers take into account a price-fixed amount in commission rebate, Opendoor Agent Partner is still required to pay a sizable referral fee, which means that same agent is able to offer a much better rate when approached directly.

For sellers, Opendoor Brokerage does not currently price fix listing rates, so consumers are likely to be referred to an agent who charges the highest commission possible - a "standard" 6% listing rate. There is little incentive for Opendoor Brokerage to connect consumers with the best and most competitive listing agents. Instead, Opendoor Brokerage aims to receive the highest referral fee possible by steering consumers toward a very limited set of agents who have a signed Referral Fee Agreement with Opendoor Brokerage.

Instead of being "sold as leads" consumers looking for a competitive and fair representation can consider negotiating directly with real estate agents, or with help from unbiased consumer-focused online services that do not collect referral fees.

Where does Opendoor Brokerage operate?

Opendoor Brokerage currently operates in select areas across United States.

Buying and Selling with UpNest

WARNING: Unlawful Kickbacks, Broker-to-Broker Collusion, False Marketing, Wire Fraud, Price Fixing.

UpNest is a broker-to-broker collusion scheme, where "partner agents" unlawfully agree to pay massive kickbacks to receive your information and engage in market allocation, consumer allocation, false advertising, unlawful kickbacks, wire fraud, and price-fixing practices in violation of, inter alia, 18 U.S.C. § 1346, 18 U.S.C. § 1343, 15 U.S.C. § 1, 15 U.S.C. § 45, 12 U.S.C. § 2607, 12 C.F.R. § 1024.14. As a consumer, you will always significantly overpay for Realtor commissions subject to hidden kickbacks and pay-to-play steering promoted in this scheme.

United States federal antitrust laws prohibit consumer allocation and blanket referral agreements between real estate companies.

Be smart; do not allow your information to be "sold as a lead" to a double-dealing Realtor in exchange for massive commission kickbacks paid from your future home sale, or your future home purchase.


UpNest works as a referral fee network that collects pricing and services data from a limited pool of Referred Agents and sends it to consumers as non-binding proposals. UpNest operates as a licensed real estate brokerage in California under BRE License # 01928572, but it does not produce any services that are typically offered by real estate agents and does not represent consumers when buying or selling real estate in any State.

When consumers submit information to UpNest, this information is simply sold to real estate agents who are willing to pay for it with a 30% share of their commission. If an Agent does not want to pay a referral fee, the consumer will not see any proposals from them using the UpNest platform.

UpNest claims to provide savings, but consumers are likely to overpay for their Referred Agent's commission due to added mandatory 30% referral fee.

UpNest Pricing

UpNest revenue comes from referral fees and sale of user data.

Listing Services

  • This Service Does Not Represent Sellers

Buyer's Agent Services

  • This Service Does Not Represent Buyers

UpNest Editor's Review:

UpNest is a referral fee network in business to collect fees for matching brokers with consumers. Referral fees are highly disadvantageous for real estate consumers because these are hidden and not negotiated. One of the major expenses for real estate consumers, when buying or selling a home, is real estate service fees and closing costs associated with the purchase, or sale.

Service fees and closing costs are, for the most part, a necessary expense. Real estate agents significantly help home buyers and sellers to navigate a complicated and competitive real estate process in exchange for a legitimate commission as a reward. Other closing fees usually include required services such as property appraisals, inspections, title insurance, etc. – all in some way help to legitimize the sale and to manage risk. There can be much said with regards to managing closing costs by choosing a motivated competitive agent who is willing to offer a buyer’s refund or a competitive listing rate.

On the other hand, while claiming it saves money to consumers, UpNest simply adds referral fees into already a fee-ridden process – consumers experience false and fabricated savings in this model. In economics, this process is known as reverse competition.

The platform works with a limited pool of Referral Agents willing to pay a very significant part of their commission to UpNest. This referral fee is back-loaded into Referred Agent's agreement, instead of being handed to the consumer directly. The consumer technically does not pay UpNest, but he/she ends up with a higher cost of commissions when working with their Referred Agent. UpNest is not a free platform, these fees are simply hidden.

Let's say a real estate consumer, James, wants to hire a buyer’s agent in one of the States that allow buyer's rebates when buying a median-priced home for $250,000. A local competitive buyer’s agent, Jill, offers James a 50% buyer's refund while helping him in this process. This is a typical refund Jill is able to organically negotiate with all her customers. The estimated commission refund, in this case, is $3,750 paid back to James from Jill in a form of buyer's refund, assuming a 3% Buyer’s Agent Commission.

On the other hand, James also receives non-binding proposals using UpNest platform from Referred Agents with a 30% referral fee attached to the back of every proposal. When James is faced with these types of proposals, results are quite different. Firmly assuming that the profit margins and service offerings remain the same for Jill and Referral Agents using UpNest, any possible buyer's refund offered by Referral Agents must be reduced to account for the UpNest referral fees. The referral fee in this scenario estimated at $1,125 due to UpNest from a Referral Agent. With the profit margin fixed, the estimated commission refund a Referral Agent may offer to James is now only $2,625.

James just effectively “paid” UpNest $1,125 for a service that is supposed to be “free”.

One reason the amount of savings may ever be matched by Referred Agents versus Jill's competitive savings is due to broker-to-broker pricing collusion - if Referral Agent is willing to reduce their fee beyond market rates to compensate UpNest out of their own pocket, which is highly unlikely and unreasonable to assume.

Because referral fees are pre-set between UpNest and Referral Agents in advance, the cost of the referral has to be eventually be paid by the real estate consumer.

The reason we give UpNest a low score is due to exigent fees and the way these fees are structured. UpNest plays down fees to consumers, it states directly that the service is 100% free, but then it rigidly locks every Referred Agent into an added cost. The vast majority of competitive agents refuse to play this game and UpNest simply steers consumers toward a limited pay-to-play network. As a licensed real estate agent that doesn't perform any real estate services, or takes any responsibility for the transaction, it's not entirely clear how this process works under the Business and Professions Code.

Should real estate agents distribute "bids" of other agents for a fee? If one to say that the 30% fee is indeed necessary, why not structure it as an actual service fee that is properly charged, instead of having to be back-loaded into Referral Agent's agreement? The answer is simple – if UpNest was to charge Agents for its service directly, no Agent would ever sign-up. Agents only sign-up with UpNest because the price of the referral fee can be easily incorporated into their client's agreement.

UpNest clearly doesn't provide any tangible value to the real estate consumers as a licensed real estate agent. UpNest further audits all transactions because it needs to find out how much money real estate agents receive in commissions, inevitably collecting private details of consumer’s agreement for home purchase or sale.

This effect is known as a “blind” match. Truly competitive agents who offer great savings to consumers can never use UpNest. For example, a highly competitive flat fee listing service has a set competitive price – they would never be able to pay 30% of this amount to a third-party. UpNest 30% referral fee only works is with services who are “silent” on their commission – if a client comes directly to an agent, one price is given, if a client uses UpNest, another price is in play. We strongly believe that real estate consumers looking to buy or sell a home should always use 0% referral fee platforms in order to avoid paying a higher cost in commissions.

By using UpNest, consumers further encourage pay-to-play referral fee bias to thrive in a broken real estate industry.

Where does UpNest operate?

UpNest currently operates in select areas across United States.