Find Out Exactly How Many Dollars You’ve Saved Thanks to TREPAC
When you’re a REALTOR®, you know how quickly commissions can get eaten away by expenses. TREPAC has successfully fought to keep significantly more money in your pocket by advocating on your behalf in the state legislature. Exactly how much money you’ve saved thanks to TREPAC depends on how much you earn, of course.
Transfer Tax
Probably the biggest difference to the industry is preventing the transfer tax on property sales. Transfer taxes have been shown to reduce sales volume by 7 percent. If you had an annual reduction of your sales volume by 7 percent, how much would that impact your bottom line? Here’s a simple formula to figure that out:
Your annual sales volume x 0.07 x your expected GCI = the impact of a transfer tax
Example: $2,000,000 X 0.07 X .03= $4,200
Mixed-Use Vehicle Tax
REALTORS® were also being targeted for a property tax on personal vehicles used for business purposes. That could have meant that you would have been assessed taxes on your vehicle twice annually. Once for having a personal vehicle and once more because you used it for business. TREPAC successfully fought against this unfair proposition. This probably saved you at least hundreds of dollars annually.
Vehicle value X 0.0275 = Potential mixed-use vehicle tax
Professional Fees
TERPAC also strongly supported legislation to repeal the $300 “occupational tax” that real estate brokers paid for their two-year license in Texas. This measure saves you $300 every year.
Tax on Services
There have been many attempts in the legislature to extend the state sales tax to include professional services. TREPAC has thus far defeated all of them. Should they have passed, your commissions would be taxed at 8.25%. If you’re an agent with $2M in sales, that’s just about $5000 that you don’t have to pay in taxes. Calculate your own rate here:
Sales volume X 0.0825 X your GCI = tax
Try it for yourself. If you add up just these four ways in which TREPAC has directly protected your bottom line, can you see the value of the work they do? Find out more at trepac.com/trepacroot/home (Texas REALTORS® login required).