NSW Introduces Laws Cracking Down on Property Underquoting Practices
Quick answer: NSW has passed the Property and Stock Agents Amendment (Underquoting and Other Agent Conduct) Bill 2026, raising the maximum underquoting penalty from $22,000 to $110,000 (or three times the agent's commission, whichever is greater), doubling dummy bidding penalties to $110,000, making price guides mandatory on every listing, and requiring agents to publish a Statement of Information showing how their price estimate was calculated. The new laws are expected to commence towards the end of 2026.
NSW has passed the toughest underquoting laws in its history. Under the Property and Stock Agents Amendment (Underquoting and Other Agent Conduct) Bill 2026, real estate agents caught misleading buyers on price now face fines of up to $110,000 — a fivefold jump from the previous $22,000 cap. If you're buying, selling, or working as an agent in NSW, here's exactly what the underquoting crackdown changes, why it happened, and what you need to do next.
Key numbers: $110,000 new maximum underquoting fine. 5x increase on the old $22,000 cap. 100+ penalty notices issued by NSW Fair Trading in 2024 alone. 10% is the maximum spread now allowed in an advertised price range. 13 32 20 is the NSW Fair Trading number to report a suspected breach.
What Is Underquoting?
Underquoting is when a real estate agent advertises a property at a price below what they genuinely believe it will sell for, or below the estimated selling price recorded in their agency agreement with the seller. The tactic is used to draw more buyers to an open home or auction, manufacture the appearance of high demand, and drive the final sale price above the advertised range. For buyers, underquoting means wasted building and pest inspections, wasted conveyancing fees, wasted finance pre-approvals, and — most damagingly — being priced out of a home they were led to believe was within reach.
The NSW Government has been explicit about the harm: underquoting wastes buyers' time, effort and money during what is often the biggest financial decision of their lives. The new underquoting laws in NSW are designed to close the loopholes that allowed the practice to continue largely unchecked.
Underquoting Laws NSW: Key Terms Explained
Before going further, it helps to understand the terminology used throughout the new legislation. These are the terms you'll see repeated across every NSW Fair Trading notice, agency agreement, and news report on this reform.
- Underquoting — advertising or verbally quoting a price below the agent's genuine estimated selling price.
- Estimated selling price — the figure an agent records in the agency agreement as their honest professional opinion of what the property will sell for.
- Statement of Information (SOI) — the mandatory disclosure document showing how the estimated selling price was calculated, including comparable sales and the suburb median.
- Price guide — the publicly advertised price or price range shown to prospective buyers on a listing.
- Dummy bidding — placing a fake bid at auction, with no intention of buying, purely to push the price up or simulate competition.
- NSW Fair Trading — the state regulator responsible for licensing real estate agents and enforcing underquoting compliance.
- Strata and Property Services Taskforce — the specialist enforcement unit within NSW Fair Trading that investigates underquoting and other agent misconduct.
- Property Services Compensation Fund — the fund that receives forfeited commissions and fees from agents found guilty of underquoting.
The Property and Stock Agents Amendment (Underquoting and Other Agent Conduct) Bill 2026
The reform package — formally the Property and Stock Agents Amendment (Underquoting and Other Agent Conduct) Bill 2026 — has now passed the NSW Parliament. It amends the existing Property and Stock Agents Act 2002 and represents the most significant overhaul of real estate advertising rules in the state in over a decade.
At its core, the Bill does four things:
- Increases the maximum underquoting penalty from $22,000 to $110,000, or three times the agent's commission, whichever is greater.
- Makes a price or price guide mandatory on every piece of property advertising.
- Requires agents to publish a Statement of Information (SOI) showing exactly how a price estimate was calculated.
- Bans agents from advertising a price below a previously rejected written offer, or below the highest unsuccessful bid at a passed-in auction.
Key point: the underquoting provisions have passed Parliament but have not yet commenced. Commencement is set by proclamation, and NSW Fair Trading has indicated the new rules are expected to start towards the end of 2026. Agents and agencies should begin preparing compliance processes now rather than waiting for the official commencement notice.
New Underquoting Penalties in NSW: The Numbers
The scale of the penalty increase is the headline of this reform. Here is how the old and new maximum penalties compare across the two conduct categories targeted by the Bill.
- Underquoting a property's selling price — previous maximum penalty $22,000; new maximum penalty $110,000 or three times commission, whichever is greater; a 5x increase.
- Dummy bidding at auction — previous maximum penalty $55,000; new maximum penalty $110,000; a 2x increase.
- Failing continuing professional development obligations — previously no standalone offence; a new standalone penalty has been introduced.
- Advertising below a rejected offer or the highest passed-in bid — previously not explicitly prohibited; now a specific offence under the Bill.
Source: NSW Government ministerial releases and the Property and Stock Agents Amendment (Underquoting and Other Agent Conduct) Bill 2026.
Agents found guilty of underquoting also risk forfeiting the fees and commission earned on the sale — those amounts are directed into the Property Services Compensation Fund rather than staying with the agent or agency.
Mandatory Price Guides and the New Statement of Information (SOI)
Two changes work together here. First, every advertisement — print, digital, on public display, or broadcast — must now carry a price or price guide. No more "contact agent" listings that leave buyers guessing. Second, agents must publish a Statement of Information alongside the listing, setting out:
- The agent's estimated selling price and how it was calculated
- Recent comparable sales used to justify that estimate
- The relevant suburb's median sale price
Where an estimate is expressed as a range, the top of the range cannot exceed the bottom by more than 10%. In practice, an agent quoting a lower estimate of $500,000 cannot advertise a range that stretches past $550,000 — closing off the "clear as mud" price guides that regulators and buyer advocates have criticised for years.
The Statement of Information model is directly borrowed from Victoria's underquoting regime, introduced there in 2016, which NSW regulators cited as the template that has led to millions in fines and is now broadly accepted across the industry.
Dummy Bidding Penalties Doubled
Dummy bidding — where a business or associate places fake bids at auction to drive up the sale price or create a false sense of competition — now carries the same $110,000 maximum penalty as underquoting, up from $55,000. This closes a related loophole where agents who couldn't legally underquote in advertising could still manipulate perceived demand on auction day itself.
NSW Fair Trading's Expanded Powers
Alongside the penalty increases, NSW Fair Trading and the Strata and Property Services Taskforce gain considerably stronger enforcement tools, including the power to:
- Compel agents to publicly disclose underquoting breaches
- Require independent valuers to certify a property's estimated selling price, at no cost to the vendor
- Suspend an agent's property sales activities under their licence
- Approve and audit training providers, with penalties for agents who skip required continuing professional development
In 2024 alone, NSW Fair Trading issued more than 100 penalty notices for underquoting offences — a figure the government has cited as evidence that the old $22,000 cap was being absorbed as a cost of doing business rather than acting as a genuine deterrent.
Timeline: How the Underquoting Crackdown Unfolded
- November 2025 — NSW Government opens consultation on proposed underquoting reforms and establishes an industry roundtable with the Real Estate Institute of NSW (REINSW) and other stakeholders.
- March 2026 — The Property and Stock Agents Amendment (Underquoting and Other Agent Conduct) Bill 2026 is formally introduced into NSW Parliament.
- June 2026 — The Bill passes NSW Parliament, locking in the $110,000 penalty cap, mandatory price guides, and the Statement of Information requirement.
- Late 2026 (expected) — Main underquoting provisions commence by proclamation; NSW Fair Trading has flagged an end-of-2026 start, but the exact date has not yet been fixed, so agencies should treat the compliance window as short.
NSW vs Victoria: How the Underquoting Laws Compare
NSW's reforms are explicitly modelled on Victoria's 2016 underquoting laws, which introduced the Statement of Information concept to the Australian market. Victoria has continued to tighten its regime — including newly proposed rules requiring agents to publicly disclose a property's final sale price once a deal becomes unconditional, part of an eight-point plan following an extensive investigative media probe into underquoting practices across that state.
NSW's $110,000 maximum penalty now sits at parity with, and in some respects ahead of, comparable state-based underquoting enforcement regimes, positioning it as one of the strictest in the country.
How to Check If a Property Listing Is Underquoted
Buyer advocates and consumer groups consistently point to the same warning signs. Before you spend money on inspections, reports, or finance approval for a listing, run through this checklist:
- Compare the advertised price guide against recent, genuinely comparable sales on the same street or in the same suburb over the last three to six months.
- Ask the agent directly for the Statement of Information and check that the comparable sales listed actually match the property in size, condition, and location.
- Check the suburb median sale price against the quoted range — a price guide sitting well below the median for a similar property is a red flag.
- If a price range is quoted, confirm the spread between the top and bottom figure is no more than 10%, as required under the new rules.
- Watch for a property that has been relisted at a lower price shortly after passing in at auction or after an offer was rejected — this is now specifically prohibited.
- Trust your own research over the agent's verbal reassurance. If something feels inconsistent with the data, ask for it in writing.
How to Report Suspected Underquoting in NSW
If you believe you have encountered underquoting, NSW Fair Trading is the regulator responsible for investigating it. You can report a suspected breach by:
- Calling NSW Fair Trading on 13 32 20 to make a verbal report or ask for guidance.
- Completing the online property complaint form through the NSW Fair Trading website, providing as much supporting detail as possible.
- Gathering evidence before you lodge the complaint — save the original listing, screenshot the advertised price guide, keep any email or SMS correspondence with the agent, and note the date, time and location of any verbal quote.
- Requesting a copy of the Statement of Information for the property, if one has not already been provided.
NSW Fair Trading will assess the complaint and may investigate further, including compelling the agent to produce evidence of how the estimated selling price was calculated. Complaints contribute directly to the compliance data the Strata and Property Services Taskforce uses to target enforcement activity.
What This Means for Buyers
If you're house-hunting in Sydney, Newcastle, Wollongong, or anywhere else in NSW, the practical upside is transparency you can act on:
- Every listing must show a genuine price guide — no more vague "contact agent" listings
- The Statement of Information gives you the comparable sales and suburb median the agent used to justify their estimate
- Agents can no longer quietly re-list a property below a bid you already rejected, or below the top price it reached at a passed-in auction
That said, transitional risk remains until the provisions formally commence — buyers should still request evidence of comparable sales directly from the agent and treat any published price guide as a starting point for due diligence, not a guarantee.
What This Means for Sellers and Real Estate Agents
For agents and agencies, the compliance burden increases materially. You'll need documented evidence behind every price estimate, updated systems for issuing a Statement of Information with every listing, and internal sign-off processes that can survive a Fair Trading audit. For vendors, this generally means a more accurate — and often more defensible — price expectation set from day one, reducing the risk of a sale falling through over a mismatched price guide.
Agencies operating across multiple NSW markets, including Sydney, Melbourne, and regional centres, should review advertising templates and agency agreements now, well before a commencement date is proclaimed.
Common Underquoting Tactics the New Laws Target
Understanding what the reforms are actually aimed at helps buyers spot red flags before they waste time and money. Regulators and industry bodies have repeatedly flagged the same handful of tactics behind most underquoting complaints in NSW:
- "Contact agent" or no-price listings — advertising with no genuine price guide at all, forcing every interested buyer to call individually and never disclosing a consistent figure. This is now directly prohibited by the mandatory price guide requirement.
- Deliberately low opening estimates — quoting a figure well below recent comparable sales in the same street or suburb, purely to generate inspection volume. The new Statement of Information requirement forces agents to show their working, making this harder to disguise.
- "Clear as mud" price ranges — advertising a wide spread (for example $600,000 to $750,000) that gives the agent room to justify almost any final sale price. The new 10% cap on the spread between the top and bottom of a quoted range directly closes this gap.
- Re-listing below a rejected offer — pulling a property from the market after rejecting a buyer's offer, then re-advertising it at a lower headline price to generate fresh competitive tension. This is now an explicit, standalone offence under the Bill.
- Ignoring a passed-in auction result — relisting a property that failed to sell at auction with a price guide below the highest bid it actually received on the day, effectively resetting buyer expectations downward. This practice is also now specifically banned.
Because the Statement of Information must reference actual comparable sales and the suburb's published median, buyers now have a documented basis to challenge a price guide that looks disconnected from the local market — something that was previously very difficult to prove without commissioning an independent valuation.
A Compliance Checklist for NSW Agencies
Agencies don't need to wait for a commencement date to start preparing. A practical readiness checklist should cover:
- Auditing current advertising templates to confirm every listing will carry a compliant price or price range
- Building a standard Statement of Information template that captures comparable sales and suburb median data at the point a listing goes live
- Reviewing internal sign-off procedures so every published estimate has a documented, defensible evidence trail
- Training sales staff and licensees-in-charge on the new 10% range cap and the rejected-offer/passed-in-bid advertising restrictions
- Confirming continuing professional development records are current, given the new standalone penalty for non-compliance
- Reviewing agency agreements and internal compliance policies with a property or commercial lawyer before the provisions commence
Given the scale of the penalty increase and the addition of licence suspension as an enforcement option, agencies that treat this as a marketing tweak rather than a compliance overhaul are taking on considerably more risk than the reforms intend.
Legal Risk for Agents Under the New Regime
The exposure isn't limited to the direct fine. Beyond the $110,000 (or 3x commission) penalty, an agent found guilty of underquoting can lose the fees and commission earned on that sale entirely, face public disclosure of the breach by NSW Fair Trading, and risk suspension of their licence to conduct sales activity. Combined with the new standalone offence for skipping continuing professional development, the cumulative risk profile for non-compliant agencies has shifted substantially.
Agencies should also review exposure under the Australian Consumer Law (ACL), which separately prohibits misleading or deceptive conduct and false representations about price — meaning a single underquoting incident can trigger liability on two fronts at once.
Industry Reaction to the Underquoting Reforms
The Real Estate Institute of New South Wales (REINSW) was consulted throughout the drafting process and has broadly supported the government's push for stronger pricing transparency, while pushing for the final rules to remain workable for day-to-day agency operations. Consumer-facing property platforms have also welcomed the direction of the reform, noting that clearer rules, better data and more consistent disclosure support both buyers and the many agents already operating in good faith. The general sentiment across both regulators and industry groups is that the previous $22,000 penalty had stopped functioning as a deterrent in a market where commissions on a single sale can run into six figures.
How Collins Quarters Can Help
Collins Quarters advises real estate agencies, vendors, and property buyers across NSW on compliance with the new underquoting regime, agency agreement drafting, FIRB and foreign investment property matters, and dispute resolution where a transaction has gone wrong. Whether you need your advertising and price-estimate processes reviewed before commencement, or you're a buyer who believes you were misled, our property and conveyancing team and dispute resolution practice can help.
Not sure how the NSW underquoting laws affect your listing, purchase, or agency compliance obligations? Book a Consultation or Inquire Now.
Key Takeaways
- NSW's maximum underquoting penalty has increased fivefold, from $22,000 to $110,000, or three times the agent's commission, whichever is greater.
- Dummy bidding penalties have doubled to $110,000.
- Price guides are now mandatory on every listing, and a Statement of Information must show how the estimate was calculated.
- A quoted price range cannot span more than 10% between its top and bottom figures.
- Agents can no longer advertise below a rejected offer or the highest bid at a passed-in auction.
- The provisions have passed Parliament and are expected to commence towards the end of 2026, pending formal proclamation.
- Buyers and agencies alike should treat the coming months as a preparation window, not a waiting period.
FAQs: NSW Underquoting Laws
What is underquoting in NSW real estate?
Underquoting is when an agent advertises a property below their genuine estimate of its likely selling price, usually to attract more buyer interest and inflate perceived demand.
What are the new underquoting penalties in NSW?
Maximum penalties rise from $22,000 to $110,000, or three times the agent's commission, whichever is greater, under the Property and Stock Agents Amendment (Underquoting and Other Agent Conduct) Bill 2026.
What is a Statement of Information (SOI)?
An SOI is a mandatory disclosure document agents must publish, showing how the estimated selling price was calculated, including comparable sales and the suburb's median sale price.
When do the new NSW underquoting laws start?
The Bill has passed Parliament, and the underquoting provisions are expected to commence towards the end of 2026 by proclamation, though an exact date has not yet been announced.
Has dummy bidding also been targeted?
Yes. Penalties for dummy bidding at auction have doubled, from $55,000 to $110,000, under the same reform package.
How do the NSW underquoting laws compare to Victoria's?
NSW's reforms are explicitly modelled on Victoria's 2016 underquoting laws and the Statement of Information concept, and now sit among the strictest underquoting penalty regimes in Australia.
How do I report underquoting in NSW?
You can report suspected underquoting to NSW Fair Trading by calling 13 32 20 or lodging a complaint through the NSW Fair Trading property complaint form, including evidence such as the listing, price guide, and any correspondence with the agent.
Can an underquoting agent lose their commission?
Yes. If found guilty, an agent can be required to forfeit the fees and commission earned on the sale, with the amount directed into the Property Services Compensation Fund.
What is the maximum allowed spread in a price range under the new laws?
The top of an advertised price range cannot exceed the bottom figure by more than 10%. For example, a lower estimate of $500,000 cannot be paired with an upper figure above $550,000.
Can an agent re-list a property below a rejected offer?
No. Under the new laws, agents are prohibited from advertising a selling price lower than a previously rejected written offer or the highest unsuccessful bid at an auction where the property was passed in.
This article is general information only and does not constitute legal advice. For advice specific to your circumstances, contact Collins Quarters. Related reading: Collins Quarters Blog | Property and Conveyancing | Dispute Resolution
