New data from the UK’s biggest estate agencies shows that the industry continues to be male-dominated with low proportions of women in the highest paid roles and gender pay gaps above the national average.
From today, companies with more than 250 staff must annually publish the mean and median pay gap – expressed as the difference in the hourly rate – between female and male salaries each year across the whole company and face fines for failing to do so.
Some agents raced to get to the deadline, only releasing their ‘gender’ reports yesterday afternoon.
Firms must also report the proportion of men and women in each pay quartile as well as the differences in bonus pay.
The national average gender pay gap among all types of firms is 18.4% but analysis of the publicly available list of published data shows that the equivalent figure for residential estate agencies is 27%.
As the table below compiled by EYE shows, Savills and JLL have the widest mean gender pay gap among estate agents, with a woman’s hourly rate being respectively 45% and 36.7% lower on average than a man’s. However, every single agency business that we looked up reported a gender pay gap.
Savills has the lowest proportion of women in the highest paid roles among estate agencies at just 18%, compared with Leaders – still primarily a lettings business – which takes the accolade of having the highest proportion of women in the most senior roles, at 56.5%.
The smallest gender pay gaps were at KFH and Westminster Council’s lettings agency CityWest Homes at 16.7% and 16% respectively.
When it comes to bonuses, men are paid 82% more than women on average at Savills, with the smallest gap at CityWest Homes where there is just a 15% difference.
Savills and JLL both said the gender gap had emerged due to the industry previously being unattractive for women.
Mark Ridley, chief executive of Savills UK and Europe, said: “We are part of an industry that has historically attracted fewer women than men, with the result that there are now more men than women at a senior level.
“Addressing this imbalance is a key focus for Savills UK and we believe that we have made significant progress over the last few years to improve diversity in our business. This is visible particularly in our graduate recruitment which has had a 50:50 male to female ratio for the last four years; females also account for 52% of Savills UK employees and were last year represented in 41% of our director promotions.”
Chris Ireland, chief executive of JLL UK, said: “We are well into our journey and, while there’s still work to be done, the good news is JLL’s gender pay gap is narrowing. This is being driven by the initiatives we’ve introduced to support our talent pipeline, diversity and building a family-friendly working environment.
“Gender pay gap reports may make uncomfortable reading, but we are pleased that the Government is making businesses publish this information.
“The data that will become available will provide a valuable benchmark which will help us achieve our ambition for a more equitable industry for tomorrow, and will also shine a long overdue light on the gender picture across UK plc as a whole.”
As EYE reported earlier this week, Rightmove has revealed a pay gap among its staff: while it has an equal pay policy, most of its higher-paid senior managers are men.
We have also asked other firms with fewer than 250 staff if they would be brave enough to submit their gender pay gap data.
Feel free to share yours in the comments below.
| Agent | Average gender pay gap | Proportion of women in highest paid roles |
Proportion of women in lowest paid roles |
Difference in average bonus pay |
| Savills | 45% | 18% | 79% | 82% |
| JLL UK | 36.70% | 25.30% | 43.20% | 78.90% |
| Foxtons | 36.20% | 28.60% | 51.10% | 22.30% |
| Romans | 31.80% | 35.30% | 51.70% | 66% |
| Carter Jonas | 31.40% | 32.30% | 79.40% | 51.20% |
| Chancellors | 30.40% | 23.10% | 54.40% | 61.20% |
| Dexters London | 28.70% | 33.30% | 58.20% | 39.50% |
| Connells | 28% | 35% | 69% | 53% |
| Your Move | 25.90% | 40.20% | 68.70% | 47% |
| Marsh & Parsons | 25.70% | 31% | 52.30% | 27.80% |
| Reeds Rains | 25.70% | 42.50% | 65.10% | 54.90% |
| Sequence | 23% | 40% | 66% | 49% |
| Countrywide | 22.90% | 44.70% | 63.70% | 45.20% |
| Knight Frank | 22.90% | 39.30% | 77.20% | 51.60% |
| Andrews | 21.40% | 29.10% | 64.20% | 54.70% |
| Leaders | 21.30% | 56.50% | 73.80% | 55.40% |
| Peter Alan Ltd | 20% | 33% | 80% | 24% |
| KFH | 16.70% | 47.40% | 47.10% | 25.10% |
| CityWest Homes | 16% | 32% | 47% | 15% |
https://gender-pay-gap.service.gov.uk/viewing/search-results?search=
Women in in Agency are often overlooked on purpose – a sad fact of all male board rooms
They need empowering to start their own businesses!
It is often the senior negotiators that are women, the ones who hold the transactions and businesses together.
They are denied the best jobs due to maternity breaks – this is also a very a sad fact.
A brand is being developed to appeal to the fairer sex, to set them on a path to being self employed and to allow them to run high service offering agencies that appeal to cash rich time poor clients.
Watch this space.
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There is a boutique agency out there and a recruitement website for parents. I was offered a fantastic opportunity but not one I could do on my own so I’d be interested to hear what this other agency may offer women,
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Call me sexist, but WOMEN MAKE BETTER ESTATE AGENTS anyway! Check out my article on this issue at http://www.estateagencyinsight.co.uk/inspiration/do-women-make-better-estate-agents
Have a great day!
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I agree Richard. Our business now has more lady negotiators than men and they are paid better – because they produce better results. Managers remain 5/2 in favour of the men but that is 2 better than 5 years ago. As an industry I really do believe we are pretty much non sexist and employ the right girl or boy (man or women) for the right job and no longer have that idea of the ladies sitting with a notebook on crossed legs taking dictation.
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They also make the better recruitment consultants Richard (in my opinion!)
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Shockingly our local estate agency pays the minimum wage. All the while he takes 7 holidays a year. Shows absolute disregard for female staff.
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In this gender-fluid world in which we now live I suggest that females who are suffering from lower pay for the same job should simply declare themselves ‘male’ and take the consequent pay rise. Problem solved. Simples!
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J1 – ‘The fairer sex’…. sexist
Richard rawlings – ‘call me sexist’…SEXIST
AgencyInsider – ‘declare themselves male’ …sexist
You probably don’t mean to be but sexism is institutionalised as these figures show.
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Not sexist in the slightest – and you know it
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Ditto. I just really hope you are not serious GeorgeHammond78.
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Then why use sexist language then? As I said, I’m sure you don’t mean to be…
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I genuinely do not understand how anyone could construe what I said as sexist.
Please enlighten me.
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Take a look at Leaders Romans Group Board Directors and you will see that actually the top board is entirely male.
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The figures sadly do not surprise me. I have been in the industry for over 20 years and have noted that many businesses still expect their staff to work ridiculously long hours, with little respect for family life. It would be interesting to also review the divorce statistics for those employed in estate agency as I feel sure they will also illustrate the lack of appreciation for a work/life balance.
I genuinely loved being an estate agent and I was good at it. However, as a devoted mother of 3 boys, it was clear that if I wanted a career in property, I would have to find something else and found a B2B role which gave me the freedom to work from home. I have never looked back. I wonder how many excellent female agents have left the business altogether because if failed to offer them any realistic way of combining work and parenthood.
Until the male dominated boards make a conscious decision to recognise the incredible contribution female estate agents make to the business, while at the same time, allowing their male colleagues to spend precious time with their families, nothing will change.
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