Is this the highest paid estate agent in Britain?...

An estate agent claims he may be the highest paid in the industry this year - and he puts it down to being self-employed.

Yesterday, controversy raged around a claim on Estate Agent Today by London-focussed agency Nested that its self-employed agents could earn up to £64,000 more than fully-employed ones.

Now a rival company - also promoting the self-employed agent business model - has come forward claiming that it has the single highest earner.

He’s Dominic Marcel who anticipates earning £328,450 this year.

He spent 11 years at Countrywide, working his way up to regional director before switching in 2018 to run his own company - Lion Estates in Milton Keynes and Leighton Buzzard – with support from Keller Williams.

It has no high street office and he says he has 190 subject to contract sales worth over £60m.

The total fees agreed come to £739,987 and his 2021 earnings to date are £246,343 based on completed sales. It is that figure he has extrapolated to get to his expected full-year earnings of £328,457.

“I took the plunge in September 2018 to earn what I believed I was worth. £246,000 this year so far isn’t too shabby and now I’m looking to build a team of high-performing agents that will work with me to replicate what I am doing several fold” he says.

“This job isn’t easy, but it is simple when you know how and I’m looking forward to coaching an expanding team and providing them the resources that they need to also earn big. This new way of working means that great agents earn well and customers also receive better, more attentive service. Everyone wins. Joining my team is a way for those worried about lead generation and admin to plug straight in and get earning faster”.

Marcel has three agents working alongside him and says the most recent recruit, in May this year, has already built a pipeline of £46,700.

The debate over self-employed estate agents has raged for some years now, promoted initially by the surge in interest and recruitment by Purplebricks - which ironically has just moved to a fully employed model.

Agencies still backing the self-employed model include Keller William, eXp, Fine & Country, Hortons, Agent & Home and more recently, Nested; Spicerhaart is launching a version of the model too.

Critics point out that the estimated earnings of the high fliers in the self-employed world exclude the costs that would be covered by employers in the traditional business model.

These costs include insurance, membership of professional organisations and some taxes; meanwhile being self-employed means not having sick pay, a company pension, company car nor other entitlements. In recent times, self-employment has also been an obstacle to securing a mortgage or other loans at favourable rates.