What would you do in this situation? Pay the fee or not?

[Chad Swinford]

My wife holds her a real estate license and is in referral status, which means we get a nice little kickback from each property that we buy/sell.  My realtor has recently moved to a new company and we were loyal and followed her so long as we were still able to get the 6% commission and the aforementioned kickback once we moved my wife's license to the agency.  

I just received a request from her that we begin paying a $206 "Agreement & Disclosure Fee charged to her at each closing.  We buy and sell several properties each year.  Most of the properties we buy are off market, but we sell them all through her.

I don't WANT to be greedy and say 'no, we won't pay that fee at each closing.  That's part of the job.', but I don't want to be foolish and just hand out money at every turn.  Again, I have been loyal and plan to continue to be loyal where it makes sense (ie, same market).

What would you do?

[Jack Medford]

How much does your wife receive as the referral agent for each deal? Is it a cut of the overall commission or a flat fee?

If you are constantly bringing deals to the same agent, I don't see why you should agree to an additional fee. Especially if services and the overall agreement has not changed. It could be something her new brokerage is pressuring her to add. 

It seems, from the way you laid it out, that the other agent is the one being greedy, not you. I would try to get more clarity from the other agent, and find out why exactly she is adding this fee after so many deals together. Even try hitting her with some of Chris Voss' techniques like "How am I supposed to do that?" **If you don't know what I'm talking about, check out the book Never Split The Difference. I highly recommend it. At the very least, listen to the podcast number 260.**