Compare Better Real Estate and Orchard
For Sellers
For Buyers
For Buyers
Answer: Better Real Estate is a referral fee network that enables broker-to-broker collusion with use of blanket referral agreements while Orchard is a full-service real estate agent and a stand-in cash program for buyers that offers savings to homebuyers and home sellers
Buying and Selling with Better Real Estate
WARNING: Unlawful Kickbacks, Broker-to-Broker Collusion, False Marketing, Wire Fraud, Price Fixing.
Better Real Estate) 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.
Better Real Estate is a real estate broker and broker-to-broker collusion scheme designed to collect fees by matching consumers with local Realtors. Better Real Estate operates as a licensed real estate brokerage in a number of states, primarily in New York as BRE Services, LLC License #10991232130
When consumers submit information to Better Mortgage or Better Real Estate, this information is shared in exchange for an undisclosed fee with random real estate agents in a process known as a "blind match." In some instances Better Real Estate acts as an affiliate of Better Mortgage and may represent consumers directly, however, Better Mortgage and Better Real Estate services are unlawfully tied.
Better Real Estate Pricing
Better Real Estate revenue comes from buyer agent commissions and undisclosed referral fees from competing Realtors. Referral fees set by such networks range anywhere between 25%-40% of the entire agent’s commission.
Better Real Estate pricing for buyer and seller representation is impossible to determine because broker services are unlawfully bundled with mortgage services where company's offers are available "to conforming loan product customers who have (a) entered a purchase contract on a home using the Better Real Estate Agent or Better Real estate Partner Agent; and (b) closed a mortgage loan on said home with Better Mortgage Corporation."
Listing Services
- This Service Does Not Represent Sellers
Buyer's Agent Services
- Find the Property
- Recommend Other Professionals
- Attend Inspection Services
- Schedule Private Showings
- Negotiate Needed Repairs
- Closing Duties
- Accept and Deliver All Offers and Counteroffers
Better Real Estate Editor's Review:
Better Real Estate is a licensed real estate broker and a broker collusion scheme that organizes and price-fixes services of competitors in exchange for hidden kickbacks it receives from the "partner agent" commissions.
Using its website, Better Real Estate engages in a process known as price fixing because it sets buyer rebates for independent real estate professionals (Better Real Estate Partner Agents) that have agreed to participate in the scheme. According to the Better.com website, "Purchase borrowers matched with a Better Real Estate Agent may receive $2,000 in lender credits and purchase borrowers matched with a Better Real Estate Partner Agent may receive up to 1% of the home sales price in lender credits." 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. Price fixing is prohibited by federal antitrust legislation. Individual agents must never discuss, or set rates with brokers outside of their own company.
By setting rates and rebates for a network of competing brokers across the United States, Better Real Estate 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.
The price fixed rates established by Better Real Estate scheme are severely inflated (for buyers, the buyer rebate is severely reduced) due to hidden kickbacks. Further, these same exact "partner agents" are in collusion with Better Real Estate, therefore, they are unethical and unlikely to provide any form of honest representation to homebuyers. Consumers using Better Real Estate "partner network" have zero control over what agents the company shares their information with. 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 kickbacks.
Better.com Price-Fixing Harms Homebuyers
Better Real Estate offers a “discount” to consumers from a blanket referral fee earned, not from a commission earned. This is a form of price-fixing and is, effectively, a kickback derived from another kickback, instead of a legal buyer's rebate mechanism.
The true intention of Better Real Estate is to motivate the consumer to use the network with a “discount” tangled as a carrot, despite the massive disadvantages of a hidden referral fee. In such a scenario, the consumer ends up grossly overpaying for their buyer's agent commission due to the hidden kickbacks between the mortgage company and the brokerage in their referral network.
Better Real Estate Partner Agents do not compete with each other in the scheme on price and level of service – they are simply farmed out to consumers. In this price-fixing scheme, Better Real Estate is not involved in a transaction of the actual home purchase. Better Real Estate LLC does not produce any tangible service to the purchaser of a home, but it merely sets up a network of brokers for its own benefit – to siphon off a cut of the buyer’s agent commission.
More importantly, price-fixing is an unlawful practice, and every agent who participates with Better Real Estate is a participant in the scheme. Saving consumers from having to pay excessive brokerage fees can never be justified with price-fixing, especially in exchange for a financial gain between brokers.
Several laws combine to form the core of federal antitrust laws, but the Sherman Act is the primary piece of these regulations. Section 1 of the Sherman Act states: “Every contract, combination in the form of trust or otherwise, or conspiracy, in restraint of trade or commerce … is declared to be illegal.” This means that (1) there must at least two parties agreeing to take action, and (2) the agreed-upon action must restrain free trade.
The parties in this case are Better Real Estate and any broker they refer a buyer to. These two independent parties are carrying out a common course of action by setting fixed commissions with the use of blanket referral agreements for mutual financial gain.
While Better Real Estate price fixes an arbitrary rate for all agents, such proposition becomes absurd when comparing home transactions worth $15 Million to home transactions worth $150,000 in different states, rural, or urban areas, variable market conditions, etc. Obviously, in some situations, consumers' interest maybe with the lowest fees, in other cases, consumers are looking for the most experienced agents, etc. Better Real Estate cannot account for these differences because the collusion scheme is not designed to deliver value, it is designed to lure consumers under a false premise for savings.
Better.com Kickbacks and Unearned Fees
Further, it is a per se violation of antitrust laws for brokers to set “standard” compensation that will be paid to other brokers. Referral fees amount paid to Better Real Estate are "blanket" fee agreements that do not comply with RESPA.
Real estate agents (only when they act in full brokerage capacity) may discuss or negotiate the referral fees concerning an individual transaction, but real estate professionals are not allowed to enter into “uniform” or “blanket” agreement on how a commission will be split, or a “standard” referral fee paid. The reason for this is exactly the premise behind the Better Real Estate scheme, where an organizer of a hub-and-spoke conspiracy steers consumers toward other brokers in exchange for a pre-arranged referral fees.
From this discussion, it becomes clear that quality and honest real estate professionals establish pricing for their services independently, and without any kickbacks. The truth is, every single agent is different, and every single agent has an individual commission structure.
The entire RESPA prohibition against kickbacks was enacted specifically to stop mortgage companies from entering into symbiotic relationships with real estate brokers. Better.com may seem like a clever by-pass of RESPA’s prohibition against kickbacks, but this loophole is built entirely on the use of blanket referral agreements between brokers designed to restrain free trade.
Better.com Tying of Services
Better Real Estate does offer brokerage services directly to consumers in some instances, but even then, these services are unlawfully tied into Better.com mortgage offerings. Better.com "savings offers" are "open to real estate agent referral customers who have (a) entered a purchase contract on a home using a real estate agent referred by Finche, LLC, dba BRE, Better Home Services and Better Real Estate; and (b) closed a mortgage loan on said home with Better Real Estate’s affiliated mortgage lender, Better Mortgage Corporation."
In this tying scheme, consumers are harmed by being forced to buy a fairly common service (mortgage origination service) to purchase a much more valuable service they want (buyer agent savings from a real estate brokerage transaction.) Consumers must be able to shop for mortgage origination services and real estate representation services independently. This tying agreement is further complicated with an unlawful price-fixing of services offered by competitors - Better Real Estate Partner Agents.
Why Better.com Colludes with Realtors?
The Realtor® commissions in the United States have long suffered from the "standard" 6% myth and the false notion that "buyer agents work for free." However, these myths cannot be resolved with price-fixing of commissions to some other level, in exchange for kickbacks. The Sherman Act imposes criminal penalties of up to $100 million for a corporation and $1 million for an individual, along with up to 10 years in prison. The actual damages are further trebled. No legitimate Realtor® will ever willingly allow themselves to be exposed to such massive liability.
The best, highly-experienced, well-educated, law-abiding, honest, and ethical Realtors® will never participate in price-fixing because it is a felony that carries massive penalties. The best Realtors® are able to recognize price fixing as wrong because they respect the true value of honest negotiations.
Better Real Estate buyer agent services and Better.com mortgage origination services are unlawfully tied. Better Real Estate engages in price fixing and consumer allocation with competitors. Why does this company do all this? This trend is a brazen new strategy used by a handful of VC-backed real estate companies, including Better.com, that are forced to deliver unreasonably high returns on billions of investments poured into them.
As of September 2021, Better.com has taken about $905 million in funding and suffers from a sky-high burn rate. To make up for this poor allocation of capital, commonly known as mega-rounds, Better.com uses a set of unlawful strategies to increase the gross revenue from mortgage origination services and real estate services by unlawfully bundling them.
The short answer is: Better Real Estate's intent to fix prices is directly tied into the massive kickbacks it receives from the "partner agents." This dynamic is archived by allocation of consumers to competitors and by the restraint of genuine competition. The "standard commissions" problem in the residential real estate sector can only be fixed legally by encouraging Realtors® to set and advertise competitive prices to consumers at scale without paying any kickbacks. All kickbacks taken by Better Real Estate are savings lost to consumers, funneled into the wrong bank account.
Where does Better Real Estate operate?
Buying and Selling with Orchard
2022 Editor’s Score Update: Orchard (formerly known as Perch) is a VC-backed real estate company headquartered in NY that has recently pivoted (changed their business model) from what used to be an iBuyer to what is now a bridge loan Fintech-assisted home buying and home selling.
This is a positive business model change that has organically improved the Editor’s score for Orchard on Geodoma platform with an updated Editor’s review for this business. The archived version of the previous Editor’s review for Orchard is available here. Geodoma Editor’s Score is adaptable to businesses in the US housing sector either improve or degrade their service offerings to consumers. An organic imporvment in Geodoma Editor’s score is a sign of companies’ willingness to improve their practices. When companies improve their practices, Geodoma Editor’s Score organically follows.
Geodoma Users’ Reviews for Orchard are published in accordance with Consumer Review Fairness Act and fair marketing and advertising principles. Geodoma never removes legitimate Users’ Reviews posted by consumers. However, we recommend that consumers reference newer Users’ Reviews posted. Some older Users’ Reviews for Orchard posted by consumers may no longer reflect upon Orchard’s current real estate and Fintech bridge loan services.
Orchard Pricing
Orchard primarily makes money with real estate commissions, but also with a difference between buying and selling each home when a home seller accepts a Guaranteed Offer. Sellers can expect to receive 80%-85% of their home value from Guaranteed Offer type of sale after any fees, cost of the minor repairs, and resale. As a Fintech-enabled Listing Realtor, Orchard Realty charges Move First fee (the same as List with Orchard fee) at 5% to 6% of your home sale (where Orchard acts as a dual agent and collects the 3% listing fee plus the 3% BAC Buyer Agent Commission.). Buy with Orchard fee is paid from the BAC Buyer Agent Commission typically offered via MLS at 2.5% to 3% to buyer agents. When acting as a buyer agent, Orchard does not offer any rebates from the BAC amount it receives, but the service includes Orchard's cash-backed offer as an added value (when compared to buying the same home with another buyer agent who does not offer rebates to buyers.)
Listing Services
- MLS Listing
- Zillow, Trulia, etc. Listing
- Accept and Deliver All Offers and Counteroffers
- Hold Open Houses
- Professional Floor Plans
- Yard Signage Installation
- Spare Key Lock-box Installation
- Schedule Inspection Services
- Schedule Private Showings
- Closing Duties
- Professional Photography
Buyer's Agent Services
- Find the Property
- Accept and Deliver All Offers and Counteroffers
- Recommend Other Professionals
- Attend Inspection Services
- Schedule Private Showings
- Negotiate Needed Repairs
- Closing Duties
Orchard Editor's Review:
Move First and Home Listing Services
Orchard Brokerage offers home sellers a Fintech-enabled buy before listing Move First bridge loan option in certain areas where it operates. This program is potentially a value-added service for consumers where a home seller can list their home for sale after they buy another home and move into a new property. This program is not free, and home sellers must be aware of program specifics to fully understand if this is the right option for your case. The Editor's review examines the program based on the cost vs benefit, as well as the available alternatives to home sellers.
The one critical difference in this program is that Orchard offers two separate (and business-wise unrelated) services to home sellers as “tied” into a single offering: (1) service of a real estate listing agent and (2) service to produce a bridge loan between two mortgages.
This tied notion is important because it directly affects the home selling fees associated with using Orchard compared to an alternative real estate service that may offer home sellers lower costs of real estate commissions and/or an alternative Fintech-enabled bridge loan program that may offer an untied bridge loan on better terms. Home selling fees (Realtor commissions) are the biggest single line-item expense in real estate transactions.
For example, let’s examine the 6% commission rate currently advertised for Move First service (if Orchard acts as a dual agent and collects the 3% listing fee plus the 3% BAC Buyer Agent Commission.) On a $4 million home sale, the total 6% gross commissions taken by Orchard amounts to $240,000. This is the amount of equity a home seller would need to convert into fees to pay Orchard for their service, and a buyer to pay for out of his/her new mortgage sum. How Orchard advertises these fees becomes very important in a competitive real estate market where competing Realtors may offer much lower listing fees or similar fees for very different services rendered.
For a home seller, it is important to shop for listing broker commissions because of the significant difference between net equity and total equity left after a home sale. The bank does not care how much in fees are lost during a sale, only homeowners’ net equity is lost in transaction fees. Remember, every dollar in net equity from a home sale is paid for with years of mortgage interest, insurance, taxes, and other life-cycle costs.
Buyer Agent Services
For home buyers, Orchard offers the services of a buyer agent supported by cash-backed offers. This bridge loan program is not free for buyers, it is a product of high interest in a short period, paid for with fees. In Orchard’s case, these fees are BAC Buyer Agent Commissions offered on MLS. However, unlike cash iBuyers that drain equity, the premise of a bridge loan cash leverage is to improve the outcome of the real estate transaction with a more reliable offer made by the home buyer, backed by rapid access to someone else’s cash. This distinction allows a buyer to use Orchard’s VC cash vault to secure a home purchase on better terms.
The purpose of the cash-backed offers benefits the home buyer, but this program also places the home buyer into an agreement with Orchard where the home buyer may face fees and penalties for backing out of the deal, as well as limited acceptance into the loan program based on home buyers’ financial standing, location, home value, and other situational requirements, etc. Orchard does not currently publish specifics for these terms anywhere, and it does not disclose the acceptance rate into the program. This is not a regular loan product, thus it largely remains a black box. It should be noted, however, that this is a universal issue with any similar Fintech bridge loan product because the program must assume that a home buyer is able (and likely) to secure a mortgage.
The home buyer pays for the bridge loan product because it is coupled with the Buyer Agent Commission (BAC) that Orchard receives from the home purchase. This amount is offered on MLS, typically at 2.5% to 3% of the home sale price. Some of Orchard’s competitors offer rebates from this BAC amount as a way to compete for home buyers' business. For example, on a $4 million home purchase, Orchard Brokerage receives about $100,000 as a Buyer Agent Commission (BAC) amount. If a competing brokerage offers a home buyer on that same sale, a 50% rebate that is a $50,000 tax-free cash in the home buyer’s bank account (this is typically subject to lender approval and only in 40 US States and Washington DC. Ten (10) US States currently maintain anticompetitive state bans on buyer rebates.) This potential cash rebate is the opportunity benefit that a home buyer gives up to use Orchard Brokerage to represent them with a bridge loan program. Is the buyer rebate better or is the bridge loan better? This is up to each home buyer to decide, but either one of these options holds an inherent value.
Guaranteed Offer
Orchard was born as an iBuyer, but the company has since shifted its business model to a Fintech-enabled Realtor. iBuyers systematically make below-market offers to home sellers, at about 80% of the true open market value when adding together the lower priced offers and the exigent fees.
For example, Orchard claims that their fees to take the Guaranteed Offer is 7% of the home value, but that does not include the hidden fees of below-market offers made to home sellers. Orchard Guaranteed Offer may seem like a good idea to a home seller, but it is probably the worst equity drain there is. Remember, a mortgage company does not care how a home seller sells their home – they receive the same remaining mortgage sum amount regardless if a home seller has lost 20% of their equity or 2% of their equity in real estate transaction fees. A 20% loss in total equity easily translates into 90% of net equity the home seller has in their home. Transaction fees in real estate are often hidden from home sellers because they are paid out from the mortgage sum, but this money is very real when it comes to the remaining net equity after the sale.
iBuying suffers from “double transaction” costs and ultra-high risks of buying and reselling a home on the open market. iBuying is systematically the most expensive way to transfer ownership of real estate in the United States. The best way for consumers to transfer real estate is on the open market, subject to competitive commissions and fees.
When Orchard Brokerage acts as a home sellers’ primary listing agent and a representative, it creates a conflict of interest by offering their client an offer on their home that the company knows is below the market price. By tying the service of a self-serving iBuyer and a service of a Realtor into a single proposition is a serious conflict. Selling directly to Orchard should be the sellers’ last resort option. Even Orchard itself admits that this program is a statistical UX failure where 95% of their customers do not choose to sell to Orchard. Orchard claims that the Guaranteed Offer helps to protect the seller, but the true cost of accepting a below-market iBuyer option makes their claims statistically unsupported. Either way, a consumer would need to hire another Realtor to help them evaluate the Guaranteed Offer from an unbiased perspective, where Orchard Brokerage cannot be trusted to make such determination in self-interest. iBuyers do not have a duty to represent home sellers, they only have to represent their balance sheets and shareholders.
Neutral Rating for Orchard
Geodoma Editor’s rating for Orchard is Neutral. First of all, Neutral is not a bad rating on Geodoma - it is Neutral. The main aspects of the Orchard services offer added value to consumers as a Fintech-enabled real estate brokerage, a bridge loan, and an inclusive home listing repairs and home staging Concierge. At the same time, some of the Orchard practices should give consumers a pause to think.
Orchard has already made a great effort to primarily switch their model from an equity-drain product of an iBuyer to use VC cash as leverage to help consumers, which means that the company is willing to improve its services. As always, Orchard’s customers are encouraged to share personal feedback as the ultimate gauge of service and value with any sentiment.