Auctions and price guides in New South Wales

A price guide in New South Wales is tied to a number the agent has already written down. The agency agreement with the vendor records the agent's estimated selling price, and nothing the agent advertises or says may sit below it. On auction day the facts are fixed. Bidders register with identification, the auctioneer may make one vendor bid and must announce it, dummy bidding is an offence, and the winning buyer has no cooling-off period.

What a price guide may say

An agent is not underquoting as long as they advertise or disclose no price below the estimated selling price in the agency agreement. The agent must give the vendor evidence that the estimate is reasonable.

If the estimate is a range, the highest price may not exceed the lowest by more than 10%. Fair Trading's own example: $500,000 to $550,000 is acceptable, and $500,000 to $600,000 is not. Agents cannot use statements such as "offers above" or "offers over", or a plus sign after a figure, or anything else that obscures the estimate. The guide is therefore a floor the agent has committed to in writing, not evidence of what similar homes sold for.

Underquoting

An agent is underquoting when a statement or advertisement about a residential property's price is less than their reasonable estimate of its likely selling price. It is an offence under the Property and Stock Agents Act 2002, and NSW Fair Trading enforces it. The maximum penalty was $22,000 before the 2026 Act raised it; the new maximum was not visible from this environment.

Reports go to NSW Fair Trading; the NSW Government's page on protecting yourself from underquoting is the starting point. Keep the listing, the guide on each date and any written price from the agent.

Reforms in train

The Property and Stock Agents Amendment (Underquoting and Other Agent Conduct) Act 2026 changes the law in two tranches.

The first tranche commenced on 29 June 2026. It raises maximum court-imposed penalties for many offences, to $110,000 for a corporation and $55,000 for an individual for some of them. Those include acting without a licence, dummy bidding and mishandling trust money.

The second tranche is announced, not yet commenced. It starts on a date to be announced, expected towards the end of 2026, once supporting regulations and forms exist. From then, agents must consider the sold prices of comparable properties, under prescribed requirements, when setting and revising their estimate. They must keep it reasonable and keep records of how it was set.

The Act also requires an agent selling a residential property to prepare a Statement of Information in a form published by Fair Trading, including comparable sales the agent has identified. The maximum penalty for non-compliance is $27,500. Which tranche brings it in, and when, is an open item on the NSW hub.

On auction day

To bid at an auction of residential or rural property in NSW, a bidder gives the selling agent their name and address and shows proof of identity. That means a government or financial institution document showing name and address, or two documents that together do. The agent enters the details in the Bidders Record and issues a bidder's number to display when bidding. Joint buyers need only one of them registered.

The vendor is entitled to one bid made on their behalf by the auctioneer, who must announce it as a vendor bid. No other vendor bid may be made at a residential or rural auction. Dummy bidding, a false bid by a non-genuine bidder to drive up the price, is illegal. The dummy bidder, the seller who asked and any agent or auctioneer involved can each be fined up to $55,000.

The reserve is the vendor's lowest acceptable price; if bidding does not reach it the property is passed in. The winning buyer has no cooling-off period, and neither does a buyer who exchanges on the same day after a pass-in. The contract signed on the day sets the deposit; the cooling-off and contracts page covers the conventions.

Reading a guide against the sales

The guide is the agent's estimate with a floor under it; the evidence is the recorded sales. Find the recorded comparable sales of similar type, size and condition, as recent as the evidence allows. Build a fair-value range from them. See where the guide sits against that range. Once the second tranche commences, the agent's own comparable sales will sit beside the guide, a second list to test rather than a reason to stop testing. Two national guides cover the method: how a fair-value range is built and what "offers over" means in your state. A Property Decision Report does that work for one property.