Compare Zillow and ReferralExchange

ReferralExchange fees come from hidden kickbacks, likely set between 25% and 40% of the gross commissions received by colluding Realtors.

ReferralExchange, Inc. (dba TopAgentsRanked, AgentMachine, TopAgentsRanked.com AgentMachine.com) is a licensed real estate firm in the State of California License No. 01426453 operates as a "shell" broker to collect an undisclosed referral fee, set at 25% to 40% from the gross commissions, paid by all colluding Realtors in the network, aka ReferralExchange Partner Agents. This fee is inevitably passed down to consumers in a form of inflated real estate commissions when selling or buying any home.

More importantly, ReferralExchange is an active licensed real estate entity that does not engage in actual real estate broker services. ReferralExchange systematically applies pay-to-play bias towards all Realtor matching results, meaning, only Realtors that have agreed to collude and pay a referral fee are matched with consumers.

Realtors only sign-up with ReferralExchange because the price of the referral fee can be easily incorporated into their client's agreement with excessive commissions.

ReferralExchange receives a low Editor's rating because this service is a biased hub-and-spoke broker-to-broker collusion scam, that falsely claims to provide an independent and unbiased service of matching consumers with agents.

ReferralExchange operates on a pay-to-play methodology to collect junk fees that needlessly make home buying and selling more expensive. In this scheme, consumers are no longer in the driver's seat, but instead, are traded as a commodity between licensed brokers.

ReferralExchange plays junk fees down on all of thier consumer-facing channels including TopAgentsRanked.com AgentMachine.com, claiming that the service is "free" "unbiased" and "no obligation" to consumers, but it rigidly locks every participating Realtor into a kickback attached to the back-end of every agreement that restrains free trade. As a licensed real estate entity that doesn’t perform any real estate services or take any responsibility for the transaction, this scheme operates to unlawfully allocate consumers and bypass RESPA anti-kickback regulations through a "shell" entity. ReferralExchange scheme operates on a false notion that all buyer agent and listing agents commissions are the same, where no Realtor in the ReferralExchange scheme competes for consumers on pricing.

Consumer brokering is an act of selling information of potential home buyers and home sellers (paid referrals) between real estate brokers, in exchange for a cut of a broker’s commission. Brokers on each side of the adopted scheme, cause direct damage to the real estate representation market with reverse competition, anticompetitive market allocation, price-fixing, lack of competition, limited choices to consumers, unnecessary high commissions, and improperly negotiated fees. A referring broker in this scheme does not compete with referred brokers, instead, ReferralExchange administers a series of agreements that restrain free trade, disguised as Realtor matching services.

12 C.F.R. § 1024.14(g)(1)(v) (Regulation X) and RESPA 12 U.S.C. § 2607(c)(3) narrowly allow payments pursuant to cooperative brokerage and referral arrangements between real estate agents and real estate brokers. This limited exemption on kickbacks only applies to fee divisions within real estate brokerage arrangements when all parties are acting in a real estate brokerage capacity. ReferralExchange shell entity does not act in a brokerage capacity, in fact, this entity willfully chooses to disengage from offering real estate representation services to consumers, as the core premise to create successful collusion through interstate wire communication to further the scheme. Wire fraud is financial fraud involving the use of any telecommunications or information technology.

Real estate transaction is a rare, high-value, and high-risk-aversion experience that is easily subjected to unlawful kickbacks, especially with the use of the Internet. Consumers are often subjected to high commissions and hidden referral fees without a full understanding that these fees increase their commissions and result in a lower quality of service. Whenever any double-dealing Realtor agrees to pay these massive kickbacks, he or she is unable to offer full and competitive representation services to anyone. ReferralExchange does not cater to honest Realtors, it only caters to Realtors willing to cheat their clients out of full services, and willing to share private information about their clients' transactions with the scheme.

ReferralExchange antitrust and consumer protection violations are not harmless. Realtors who attempt to compete for consumers on fair terms and competitive pricing are at a massive disadvantage in this environment. As a result of broker-to-broker collusion, consumers end up getting steered toward a limited pool of dishonest Realtors and overpay for commissions. Consumers’ private transaction information is always shared with a referring broker that requires it to be disclosed to calculate the referral fees to be paid at the close of each transaction.

Consumers, of course, pay for this abuse with higher costs of commissions that, eventually, make it directly into their new mortgages and cause significant losses of net equity from a home sale.

In reality, ReferralExchange is a 100% biased, pay-to-play collusion steering mechanism between licensed brokers, that costs consumers tens of thousands compared in inflated commissions compared to open market savings. ReferralExchange specifically steers consumers into the network in exchange for massive kickbacks pre-negotiated in advance. ReferralExchange operates on false notions that "buyer agents work for free" and that all commissions are" standard" to justify a "standard" referral fee.

There are numerous reasons why consumers are wise to avoid the ReferralExchange scheme, but probably the most important reason is that the lack of transparency and honesty is contagious. ReferralExchange scheme attracts ONLY double-dealing Realtors who are willing to break a host of federal antitrust laws, and unwilling to compete for consumers with transparency. An unethical Realtor will always find a way to turn the most important transaction into a self-dealing proposition - to collect a bigger commission check faster without any regard for what is truly a good deal for their clients.

Why Does ReferralExchange Engage in Collusion?

Plain agreements among competitors to divide sales territories or assign customers are almost always illegal. These arrangements are essentially agreements not to compete.

ReferralExchange engages in consumer allocation because it is an active real estate entity that refuses to compete with other real estate agents who patriciate in the scheme. This dynamic is better known as a hub-and-spoke conspiracy. In a hub-and-spoke type conspiracy, all Realtor commissions are set at the same amount for all Realtors, where none of the "partner agents" compete with one another on pricing at all. ReferralExchange scheme produces absolutely no tangible service as a licensed broker to anyone and instead delivers inflated prices and lower quality of service. The scheme originates as a conspiracy to restrain trade and to funnel consumers toward the scheme and away from the open market. There are hundreds of thousands of highly competitive Realtors who offer great savings and great service, and they refuse to pay kickbacks or collude with ReferralExchange shell brokerage.

The illicit kickback is the reason why ReferralExchange colludes with Realtors outside their firm. ALL consumers and ALL legitimate Realtors are scammed by ReferralExchange, even if the experience may seem "good enough" because collusion is a faulty shortcut to genuine open competition between Realtors. Federal laws require all Realtors to compete for consumers and to deliver a tangible service, a simple test ReferralExchange brokerage entity decisively fails. Open competition is at the core of our free and independent society everywhere in America.

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." ReferralExchange is a direct extension of these uncompetitive, unethical, and unlawful notions. ALL Realtors who participate in the ReferralExchange scheme are engaged in plain collusion, where each Realtor knows that ReferralExchange shell brokerage will not compete at all, in exchange for a blanket kickback from the home sale or a home purchase. 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 for each count. Persons found guilty of wire fraud under federal law face fines up to $250,000 for individuals and up to $500,000 for organizations, subject to imprisonment of not more than 20 years. There are additional penalties of 30 years imprisonment and a million-dollar fine if the wire fraud involves a financial institution. These penalties are per count, which means that each electronic communication can be considered as a separate count. 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 collusion because it is a felony that carries massive penalties. The best Realtors can recognize collusion as wrong because they respect the true value of honest negotiations.

When ReferralExchange refuses to compete with these brokers and instead organizes "partner agents" into a network, it breaks an entire host of basic open commerce principles that guide our open and fair markets. Moreover, ReferralExchange extends this conspiracy all across the United States via its website, making the scheme highly damaging due to the scaled use of the Internet to transmit collusion. The Internet, like any other scaled telecommunications medium, can be used to transmit open competition just as easily as pay-to-play fraud.

Most consumers do not know that ReferralExchange is a licensed real estate brokerage because the nature of the scam requires this information to be deliberately hidden. ReferralExchange scam is built entirely on false advertising to deliberately deceive consumers. This shell broker presents itself as an unbiased marketplace, but it is a real estate broker that engages in unlawful activities under federal laws. The short answer is: ReferralExchange's intent to allocate consumers as a secret real estate shell entity is directly tied into the kickbacks it receives from the "partner agents." This dynamic is a product of 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.