Croatia's new real estate brokerage law: what it actually changes, and what it doesn't - Ivan Kovačić for Forbes Croatia

Croatia's new Real Estate Brokerage Law introduces important changes to how brokerage services, agency commissions and buyer representation are regulated. Contrary to widespread public perception, the new legislation does not abolish buyer commissions or fundamentally change how the Croatian real estate market operates. Instead, it introduces greater transparency in brokerage agreements, clearer rules on agency fees and stronger professional standards for licensed real estate agents.

According to Ivan Kovačić, owner of Remington Real Estate Croatia, the exclusive affiliate of Christie's International Real Estate in Croatia, the law should not be viewed as a revolution, but as an important step towards a more transparent and professional real estate market. The greatest source of confusion, he argues, was not the legislation itself, but the way it was communicated to the public.

For months, media coverage suggested that buyers would no longer pay agency commissions and that the so-called "double commission" model would disappear. In reality, the new law distinguishes between viewing a property and contracting professional buyer representation. 

The message was the problem

The term "double commission" misrepresents how the existing model actually worked. In standard practice, the arrangement was not one where the same service was billed twice. It was a model in which both the seller and the buyer could make use of certain brokerage services and contribute accordingly to the overall fee. That model can be made more transparent and better structured, but framing it as something inherently dishonest or unlawful does not accurately describe what was happening in the market.

Equally important is a distinction that received far too little attention: under the new law, buyers do not simply stop paying commission. A buyer who engages a broker and uses their professional services can still be charged a fee. What changes is that a buyer who merely responds to a listing and wants to view a property, without having contracted any brokerage service for themselves, cannot be charged for doing so. It is a meaningful nuance, and one that the public debate largely failed to draw.

Viewing a property is not the same as professional representation

This distinction points to a deeper issue. Allowing a buyer to see a listed property is one thing. Actively searching the market on their behalf, advising them, analysing documentation, identifying legal and financial risks, supporting negotiations, and coordinating the transaction with lawyers, banks, notaries, and other parties -that is something else entirely, and it carries real, demonstrable value.

The question worth asking is whether the law's public framing will lead some buyers to conclude that professional support is no longer necessary, and whether that leaves them less protected, not more. Buying a property is among the largest financial decisions most people will ever make. A buyer who proceeds without expert guidance may save on a fee in the short term, but may also be walking into significant exposure: unclear ownership documentation, undisclosed encumbrances, missing permits, misjudged market value, or a poorly negotiated final price.

The correct reading of the new law is not that buyers no longer need agencies. It is that buyers should never be compelled to pay for a service they did not request, but should always have the option to commission professional support when they want a safer, better informed transaction.

Commission doesn't disappear. It gets restructured.

As Kovačić explains, one of the law's substantive changes concerns how brokerage fees are presented and contracted. Going forward, agents will be required to show the total brokerage fee for a transaction transparently, with that fee typically contracted with the seller. Buyers pay only when they have specifically contracted and used a brokerage service for themselves.

In practice, this moves the industry away from a model where fees were separately negotiated with each party toward one where the total cost of professional intermediation is more formally and visibly structured. Transparency increases, but the economic reality does not change. The value of professional brokerage is ultimately determined by the market: the complexity of the transaction, the scope of service, the level of responsibility involved. No legislative formula changes that.

What the law gets right

Beyond the fee structure, the new legislation contains meaningful improvements that deserve recognition. A mandatory Code of Ethics moves professional conduct from an internal industry matter into the formal legal framework, a significant step toward the kind of professionalisation the market has long needed. Compulsory liability insurance for brokers has been increased, and the rules around property advertising have been tightened, including a prohibition on listings that lack a proper contractual mandate.

That last point is more consequential than it might appear. For years, the Croatian market tolerated a practice in which properties were advertised without clear authorisation, without controlled information, and often without genuine accountability to either party. If the new law succeeds in cleaning that up, alongside stronger ethical standards and a clearer fee structure -it will have made a real contribution to the functioning of the market.

New rules, greater clarity

The new law should be neither celebrated as a victory over the brokerage industry nor dismissed as an attack on a workable model. The truth, as Kovačić puts it, is more complex than either camp is willing to admit.

In large part, the legislation represents a genuine step toward a more transparent, better regulated, and more professionally structured market. At the same time, some of its provisions will require serious adaptation, particularly around how fees are divided, contracted, and communicated to clients. What matters most now is that the conversation moves out of the political arena and back into a professional one. Commission does not disappear because the way it is contracted changes. Professional service retains its value regardless of how it is labelled. And the market will need to find a sustainable model in which relationships are clearer, clients are better informed, and the service is honestly contracted and fairly delivered.

That is not a defence of old practice. It is the necessary condition for building something better.

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