> Agents getting paid a percentage of what their clients get isn't the concern here, and is generally considered good in the sense that the more they get for you (their client) the more they take home.
That's the theory, but then it turns out to be a lot more profitable to get commissions for selling five houses for $400K each than to spend the same amount of time to sell one house for $550K.
Cue statistics about real estate agents selling their own homes for substantially more than they get for their clients.
Sure; the point of paying them a percentage is to get their incentives to roughly align with yours. Short of giving them 100% you should expect that at some point that breaks down and they will figure the next optimization isn't worth it when it would be to you with your larger share.
But that's very different from this situation described here, where the agent serves a different and in fact diametrically opposed master.
I think the statistics were also that real-estate agents houses also stay on the market longer than other houses. Which also agrees with what you're saying. Essentially they can maybe make 6% of 20-50k more but it would require weeks more work on their part so it's not nearly as big a deal to the agent as it is to the owner.
That's the theory, but then it turns out to be a lot more profitable to get commissions for selling five houses for $400K each than to spend the same amount of time to sell one house for $550K.
Cue statistics about real estate agents selling their own homes for substantially more than they get for their clients.