Part 2 The Beautiful Lie of REA Group: The Troll, the Candy Store, and the Bridge We Can’t Quit
Previously in The Tribune:
REA Fixed Real Estate Agents Just Hate That It Worked
The Hero Myth That Killed You
Everything you’ve built — the listings you parade, the paper‑thin reputation you think is bulletproof, the database you guard like contraband — sits on a cliff edge. One stupid misstep, one bad quarter, and it’s gone. Sometimes overnight. Sometimes a slow bleed. The margin is always thinner than you think.
While you were polishing ego — preaching “local knowledge,” whispering prices like sacred lore — REA built something bigger. They didn’t just out‑market you; they dismantled the whole game. They turned secrets into public property. They made buyers stop needing you.
Now you’re paying for the privilege of breathing their air. Dropping thousands for premium spots just to stay visible. Watching the audience you once owned vanish into someone else’s platform.
Here’s the twist: you didn’t lose it. You gave it away. One listing at a time. Because you believed you couldn’t be replaced.
Spoiler: you already were.
And tomorrow? Buyers won’t ask you for advice — they’ll ask AI. Vendors won’t trust your “gut” — they’ll trust the algorithm in their pocket. The data you once locked away? Everyone has it now, updated hourly.
This isn’t disruption.
The beauty of buildings is in their collapse — not gradual, but spectacular, hopeless, and final.
REA didnt move in, they colonized monkey island.
Historical Parallel: Standard Oil’s Ghost
1900: Standard Oil refines 90% of U.S. oil. Antitrust outrage follows. The trust is broken up in 1911.
Headlines call it victory.
But Exxon, Mobil, Chevron — the fragments — still dominate. Regulation shifted structure, not gravity.
Same pattern today: even if REA’s logo fractured, the reflex — Australians starting every search on realestate.com.au — would survive.
Monopolies don’t die.
They morph.
Tech Accelerates; Agents Stall
By 2030, 60–80% of agent tasks vanish into automation: copywriting, scheduling, lead triage, even pricing feedback loops. The grunt work dies first.
What remains? Human nuance: reading a room, negotiation at the kitchen table, managing chaos mid‑collapse. Hyper‑local storytelling algorithms can’t fake (yet).
Few agents prepare. They double down on “relationships” and “local knowledge,” ignoring that portals now know suburb trends better than they do.
Nostalgia isn’t strategy.
Tomorrow’s Agent: The Last Ones Standing
The survivors won’t look like today’s churn‑and‑burn salespeople. They’ll look like this:
- Negotiation strategist + emotional anchor.
- AI‑drafted listings, VR tours, predictive analytics — baseline, not bonus.
- Hyper‑local obsession: one or two postcodes, total immersion.
- Micro‑brands: TikTok, newsletters, radical transparency.
- Flat‑rate or hybrid fees; itemized value: “What did you do REA couldn’t?”
- Dead weight: agents clinging to clichés. Camera‑shy equals unemployed.
📘 Real Estate Agent Guides
1) CPP41419 Complete Guide
📑 Requirements, costs, pathways — the definitive walkthrough.
📖 Open Guide
· Is CPP41419 Right for You? (Quiz) · Provider Directory
Survival isn’t knowing more.
It’s feeling more.
Part II: Why Do Real Estate Agents Hate realestate.com.au
2030: The Quiet Handover
ACCC probe wraps. Fee transparency lands. Premium campaigns keep climbing. By 2026, AI pricing and predictive analytics go mainstream; portals widen their lead.
By 2028, REA integrates mortgages and conveyancing — portal as full transaction layer. Direct buyer‑seller “lite” sales emerge. Mid‑tier agents collapse. Industry shrinks toward boutiques and megateams.
By 2030, agent count halves. Public outrage fades into budgeting. $6,000 portal fees feel normal. REA functions like Google: indispensable, unloved, unavoidable.
The collapse won’t look like fire. It’ll look like silence.
No calls. No leads. No database to save you. Just the hum of a portal you don’t control — doing the job better, faster, cheaper.
You gave it away.
You can still take it back — one negotiation at a time.
“REA didn’t break real estate. It fixed it — and sent the bill.”
Real Estate Agent State Licensing Guides
2) State Licensing Requirements — 2025
🗺 Rules across all Australian states, updated.
3) Budget Courses Under $1000
💰 Transparent comparison of affordable training options.
📖 See Options
· Response-Time Analysis · Rating Methodology
Part II: Why Do Real Estate Agents Hate realestate.com.au
Simon Dodson doesn’t predict real estate’s future — he documents its present while everyone’s still denying it. Through CPP41419.com.au, he’s building an ark for the flood the industry insists isn’t coming.
His specialty: translating Silicon Valley disruption into Australian property vernacular. His method: data-driven analysis wrapped in cultural commentary, delivered with the bedside manner of an emergency room doctor who’s seen this before.
Published author, Feature writer for Venture Magazine, Builder, and noise maker wherever uncomfortable questions need asking. Cited in boardrooms, blacklisted in others. The kind of analyst you read secretly before publicly disagreeing with.
