Net vs. Gross: Understanding Your Real Income.
In real estate, your Gross Commission Income (GCI) is a vanity metric. What matters is your net take-home pay after splits, caps, transaction fees, marketing expenses, and taxes. Let's break down where the money goes.
Interactive Gross-to-Net Split Calculator
Calculated Allocations
Where Does the Gross Commission Go?
When a property closes, the closing agent or escrow company pays the total commission pool directly to your sponsoring brokerage. Before a dollar reaches your bank account, several deductions take place:
- The Sponsoring Broker Split: Sponsoring brokerages collect a split cut (e.g. 20% or 30%) to cover desk space, cloud infrastructure, local office management, and compliance reviews.
- Franchise Fees: National franchises (like Keller Williams, Century 21, or Coldwell Banker) often levy an additional 6% to 8% royalty fee on top of the local split, capped at a specific annual amount.
- E&O and Transaction Fees: Standard Errors and Omissions insurance and broker review fees (ranging from $25 to $100 per deal) are deducted directly at closing.
- Direct Transaction Expenses: Marketing costs, photography, staging, signs, MLS listing fees, and lead generation expenses are paid directly by you.
The Split Cap: Your Route to 100% Commissions
A commission "cap" is the absolute maximum split amount that your broker can collect from you in a single anniversary year. Once your accumulated split contributions reach this cap threshold (e.g. $16,000 at eXp Realty or $12,000 at Real Brokerage), you keep 100% of your commission on subsequent transactions for the rest of your anniversary year.
Tracking this cap dynamically is essential for calculating cash flow and estimating your quarterly tax reserve needs.
Ditch the spreadsheets. Track splits & caps automatically.
MyAgentCommissions monitors your closed sales, calculates splits and franchise caps dynamically, reserves taxes, and updates your true net income YTD.