Commercial Real Estate Agents: directory of firms

Because commercial work is an area of practice rather than a separate licence, the training obligation is what distinguishes a genuine commercial agent from a residential salesperson taking on a warehouse listing. NSW Fair Trading requires agents to complete the compulsory CPD topics for every area of practice in which they actually operate, and not to complete modules for areas their licence authorises but they never touch.

An agent who lists both houses and industrial units therefore carries more training than one who does either alone. When you interview an agent for a commercial listing, asking which areas of practice they complete CPD for is a more useful question than asking how long they have held a licence.

Victoria's underquoting laws apply to residential property sales. Consumer Affairs Victoria is explicit that they do not apply to the sale of rural, commercial and industrial properties. There is no Statement of Information for a factory, and no prescribed comparable-sales disclosure.

What does still apply is the false and misleading representation provisions of the Australian Consumer Law, which sit in Schedule 2 to the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 and bind an agent marketing any property. In practice this shifts the burden onto the buyer's own due diligence: verify the rent roll, read the leases, check the outgoings history, and treat a marketed yield as a claim to be tested rather than a disclosed figure.

The Building Energy Efficiency Disclosure Act 2010 is a Commonwealth statute that catches larger office space rather than commercial property generally. Its section 11 is headed "No sale, lease or sublease without a building energy efficiency certificate", and section 15 requires advertisements to include an energy efficiency rating. Certificates are applied for and issued under the Act, recorded on a Building Energy Efficiency Register, and prepared by assessors accredited under Part 3.

For an agent, this is a lead-time problem more than a compliance problem: the certificate has to exist before the campaign starts, so it belongs in the listing conversation, not in the week before the first inspection. The Act also provides for exemptions, both on application and automatically, which is worth checking before assuming a building is caught.

A leased asset sells to investors, and the questions are about income durability: who the tenant is, how long the term runs, what the review mechanism does, and what happens at expiry. A short remaining term can be a discount or an opportunity depending on the market, and a strong covenant on a long lease usually commands the sharpest price.

An empty building sells to occupiers and developers, and the questions are about use: zoning, floor plate, clearance, power supply, truck access, parking and what a planning authority will allow. The two buyer pools rarely overlap, so choosing which one to target is the first strategic decision, and it drives everything from the price guide to where the campaign is advertised.