Lead generation for real estate agents
Real estate agent lead generation. Rent the portal, or build what you keep.
Most agents buy their first leads from a portal. That works until the zip code gets crowded or the referral fee eats a third of the check. Here is what the big portals publish about their pricing, and what an owned pipeline changes.
- Google Ads at 10% of budget, $600 CAD or $450 USD minimum
- $0 setup, month to month
- First month guaranteed or it costs nothing
Who sells you leads today
Three portals, three very different bills. Each point below is drawn from the portal's own help or agent pages, as published in September 2026. Pricing changes, so check the current page before you sign.
Zillow Premier Agent: you bid for a zip code
Zillow's agent pages say Premier Agent cost is set by demand in each zip code, so there is no flat national price. More than one agent can buy the same zip, which means a buyer on a listing can reach whichever paying agent wins that moment. Fixed-term contracts carry an early termination fee of twice the monthly minimum spend.
Zillow Flex: nothing upfront, a cut at closing
Flex has no zip code fee. Zillow instead bills a percentage of your commission on any sale or purchase that closes from a Flex connection. It feels free in a slow month and gets expensive in a good one, because the fee grows with every deal you close.
HomeLight: a third of the commission
HomeLight's own help center states its referral fee rose from 25% to 33% of the agent's commission on referrals claimed from October 25, 2022. The fee is owed when the deal closes, and a claimed referral stays active for three years. There is no upfront charge, and there is no cheap closing either.
Realtor.com: priced on a sales call
Realtor.com's Connections Plus sends buyer contacts by push, email and text, but Realtor.com does not publish a rate card, a contract length or exclusivity terms. You learn the price only after you talk to their sales team, so you cannot compare it side by side.
What an owned pipeline changes for an agent.
The seller lead is the one worth owning
Portals are built around buyers browsing listings. Seller leads, the ones that become listings, come from searches like “what is my home worth” and “sell my house [city]”. A home valuation page with a short form, built on your own site, brings sellers to you and not to a shared zip code.
Google Ads you can switch off by neighbourhood
You choose the neighbourhoods, the search terms and the daily budget. We charge 10% of what you spend, $600 CAD or $450 USD at minimum each month, and pass clicks through with no markup. The spend goes to Google in your name, so the account and its history stay yours.
Local SEO that keeps paying after a slow month
Neighbourhood guides, a sold-homes page, and a Google Business Profile with steady reviews keep working when you pause spend. SEO bills per page, $50 CAD or $38 USD, starting from ten pages in a month. A page you own still ranks next spring. A zip you stopped paying for does not.
Follow-up fast enough to beat the next agent
A portal buyer often inquires with several agents at once. We set up instant text and email replies, route new leads to your CRM (Follow Up Boss, kvCORE, Lofty or whatever you run), and flag any lead with no reply after a set time. Speed matters more than the source.
The first 30 days.
01
Week 1: count what the portals cost you
We line up your last year of portal spend and referral fees against the deals they produced. That gives your real cost per closing today, which is the number any new channel has to beat.
02
Weeks 2 and 3: build the seller path
A home valuation page, two or three neighbourhood pages, call and form tracking, and a Google Ads campaign on seller and buyer terms in your farm area. Everything is tagged so each lead shows its source.
03
Week 4: the acceptance test
The test is simple: we submit a fake valuation request and call each tracked number, and every one must reach Follow Up Boss or your CRM straight away with its source, while the report shows cost per lead by campaign. If that is not true, you do not pay for the month.
Real estate agent lead generation: FAQ.
No. Keep what is working while the owned pipeline builds. Compare cost per closing each month, then cut the portal spend that loses. If you are on a fixed Zillow term, check the early termination fee in your contract first.
Zillow's own pages say several agents can advertise in one zip code. HomeLight matches clients from its network. Realtor.com does not publish exclusivity terms. Ask each provider in writing before you pay.
Not always. Many brokerage sites cannot hold a real valuation page or clean tracking, so some agents need a small site of their own. A one-time site build ranges from $1,500 to $20,000+, and we will tell you if you can skip it.
Housing ads on Google fall under its personalized advertising policy, which limits targeting by age, gender, parental or marital status, or zip code. Your brokerage and your province or state also set rules on how you name the brokerage in ads.
Ads cost you 10% of your Google budget on top of the spend itself, $600 CAD or $450 USD minimum. Neighbourhood and SEO pages are $50 CAD or $38 USD each, from 10 a month. There is no setup fee or term, and your free proposal lands within a business day.
Find out what your leads really cost.
Send us your portal spend and your farm area. Your proposal, priced from our public rate card, comes next business day.