How Kinnara charges agents
An agent can list on Kinnara in one of two ways:
- Free listing. Put property on the platform at no cost.
- A paid network plan. Agents who want more from the platform can choose a paid plan.
What no agent pays is a share of the sale. Kinnara takes no sales commission on any property it lists, whatever the price and whoever buys it.
Why Kinnara charges no commission to local agents
Take a typical independent agent in Bali or Phuket. Their buyers are more and more often foreign, but their marketing reach is mostly local. Finding buyers in Australia or Singapore on their own would mean advertising in other countries and other languages, which few small agencies can afford.
Kinnara gives that agent reach without asking for part of the fee they earn. The agent keeps the relationship with the seller, runs the sale, and keeps the commission.
A commission split would change the maths. Every sale through the platform would be worth less to the agent than one they found themselves. Agents in that position tend to keep their best listings back. With free or flat-fee listing, there is no reason to hold anything back.
More than 15,000 agents now list on Kinnara across 44 countries. I don't think we would have reached that number by asking each of them for a slice of every sale.
Why I look at it from the agent's side
I run an agency myself. Since 2020 I have led Prestige Pinnacle Realty, a prestige residential agency, as its Managing Director, so I know what an agent's commission has to pay for.
It covers photography and advertising, time spent on inspections that go nowhere, staff, travel and the months between sales. By the time a sale settles, much of that fee is already spent. A platform that takes a cut on top makes every one of those costs harder to carry.
That is how I want Kinnara to work. The platform should add buyers to an agent's business, not take margin out of it.
Kinnara markets property; it doesn't sell it
This is the part I care most about. Kinnara advertises property, finds buyers through the platform and its campaigns, and puts them in touch with the agent or developer. It doesn't own or build what it lists, and it never signs the sale contract. The buyer and seller sign that with each other.
Taking a commission would blur that line. It would give the platform a direct financial stake in whether each deal closes. I'd rather Kinnara's incentive was simply to market well and send good enquiries.
Money is part of the same rule. Buyers pay the developer they contract with, or an escrow account. Kinnara, as the marketer, never holds buyer funds. That rule, and the others I now run my companies by, came out of mistakes I describe openly on my lessons page.
Developers and the same rule
Over 120 developers use Kinnara to market their projects, ranging from large listed Thai companies to small villa builders. Each gets a showcase page and is presented to the buyer network.
Kinnara Capital, the development business I also lead, has a contract with Kinnara like any other developer. Keeping the two separate, with the sale contract always between buyer and developer, is deliberate.
How it compares with portals in Australia
Australian readers will know realestate.com.au. Kinnara works on a similar principle. The portal charges for advertising and reach, not a cut of the sale price.
The difference is the job. An Australian portal mostly connects Australian buyers with Australian agents. Kinnara connects buyers in one country with agents in another, which means handling languages, currencies and time zones on top. I go through that side in one search across 76 portals.
What this means for buyers
For a buyer, the no-commission model has two practical effects.
You deal directly with the agent or developer. Kinnara passes your enquiry to the person who holds the listing. The negotiation and the contract are between you and the seller.
Your due diligence is still yours to do. A marketing platform can check who it works with, and Kinnara runs background checks on development partners and their directors before listing a project. It can't replace your own lawyer, title checks and permit checks. My note on checking a developer before you buy off-plan sets those out.
Foreign buyers in Indonesia should also understand how ownership works for them. The foreign ownership page covers it. The platform itself is at kinnara.asia.
This note is general information only. It is not legal or financial advice.