The moment everything feels fine is when the risk is highest
Picture this: a listing agent in JVC gets a WhatsApp from a buyer-side agent at another agency. The buyer is serious, wants to view today, and is ready to move fast. Both agents are experienced, nobody wants to slow things down over paperwork. They agree on a 50/50 split of the 2% commission in the same chat thread and focus on what matters — getting their respective clients to a yes.
The viewing goes well. The offer comes in. The seller accepts. Form F gets signed. The buyer hands over the 10% deposit cheque. The commission cheque — one, to the listing agency — gets collected at the trustee office.
Then the buyer’s agent asks about their half.
That is where things quietly begin to unravel. The listing agency’s accounts team has no Form I on file. There is no signed inter-agency agreement. There is a WhatsApp thread, a few voice notes, and a verbal understanding that both sides thought was clear. What follows is rarely a quick resolution. It is usually weeks of chasing, a dispute that poisons what was a good professional relationship, and sometimes a loss that goes unrecovered.
This is not an unusual story. It is the most common story. When two brokers collaborate on a deal, the commission structure must be agreed upon in advance — without a clear agent-to-agent agreement, many agents end up in costly disputes or losing their commission entirely. The reason it keeps happening is not that Dubai agents are careless. It is that the informal working culture of the market — the speed of it, the relationship-based nature of shared listings, the pressure to move before someone else does — creates the exact conditions in which documentation gets skipped, then disputed.
Why “we agreed” is not the same as an agreement
Commission disputes are fact-specific — who introduced whom, what was signed, what was paid. When a dispute reaches RERA or the DLD, those three questions are the ones that matter. Not who sent the first WhatsApp. Not who did more viewings. Not who had the stronger relationship with the client.
RERA expects all commission arrangements to be documented in Form A or Form B. Commission agreements between agents — for instance, when a buyer’s agent and a seller’s agent split a fee on a co-broke deal — are governed by RERA Form I, which must be formally signed before any commission is disbursed.
The word “formally” is doing a lot of work there. Verbal agreements are extremely difficult to enforce in Dubai. The same principle applies between two agents as it does between an agent and a client. A conversation, even one confirmed in a message thread, does not produce the evidence a regulatory body can act on with the same clarity as a signed form.
A verbal or email-based split agreement that is never formally logged leaves both agencies relying on memory and goodwill — a fragile foundation when real money is on the line.
The fragility matters most at the exact moment money arrives. When a commission cheque lands, it goes to one entity: the listing agency. That agency then decides — based on whatever agreement exists — what gets paid to whom. If there is no signed Form I, the buyer’s side agent is entirely dependent on the goodwill of the other agency’s accounts department. That is not a position any agent should be in after doing the work.
The forms that exist, and why they are not always used
Dubai’s regulatory framework is genuinely well-designed for protecting everyone in a deal, provided the forms are used correctly.
Form A is signed between a property owner and their listing agent. It authorises the agent to market and sell or lease the property. Form A is mandatory for marketing the property on public portals. Without it, the Trakheesi permit that makes a listing legal on Bayut, Property Finder, or any other portal cannot be generated. Agents know this. Form A compliance is, in most agencies, non-negotiable.
Form B documents the buyer’s representation agreement with a real estate agent. It confirms that the agent is representing them in the search and transaction. Form B is where buyer-side agents protect their right to a commission if the buyer they introduced closes a deal — it is less universally used than Form A, and that gap creates disputes.
Form I governs the co-brokerage relationship between two agents, formalising the commission sharing structure. It defines the commission split between the two agents, outlines each agent’s role and responsibility, and protects both agents from commission disputes.
Form I is mandatory when two agents are co-broking a deal. Mandatory — not optional, not best-practice, not advisable. Mandatory. Yet the most common mistakes agents make are: not using Form I during agent collaborations; forgetting to register Form A with DLD; ignoring Form B and missing the chance to protect buyer-side commissions; and unclear commission splits leading to disputes.
The pattern here is consistent. The forms that govern the agent-to-client relationship (Form A) tend to be used because the system enforces them — you cannot advertise without a Trakheesi permit, so Form A gets signed. But the forms that govern agent-to-agent arrangements (Form I) and buyer representation (Form B) are easier to skip in the rush of a moving deal, and nobody locks you out of a portal for missing them. The enforcement loop is weaker, and that is exactly where disputes concentrate.
Where the split actually breaks down: the timeline problem
The split percentage is rarely what two co-broking agents actually argue about. When a deal is moving, a 50/50 is usually assumed, and in most sales that assumption is correct. In Dubai, there is no official law dictating the exact split for agent-to-agent commissions, but the commonly accepted standard for both sale and rental transactions is a 50/50 split of the total commission. Sometimes the listing agent will offer a smaller split, for example 60/40, if they have exclusive rights.
The real friction comes from timing and process, not the split percentage itself.
Who collects the commission, and when
Agent commission — typically 2% of the sale price — becomes legally due upon Form F signing. But it is not always paid at Form F. Even when commission is “earned” at the MOU, payment may be structured as a portion at MOU and the remainder at transfer. That structure is common, and it creates a gap. The buyer’s agent has completed their work. The deal is signed. But the money has not moved yet — and until the listing agency receives and processes their full commission, nothing flows to the co-broke side.
If the deal hits a snag between Form F and transfer — a mortgage delay, an NOC problem, a title deed complication — the buyer’s agent is waiting, with no contractual leverage, if no Form I was signed before the deal moved forward.
The most common MOU dispute involves buyers who sign Form F without confirmed mortgage approval and then cannot complete within the agreed transfer timeline. For agents, that deal delay means a commission delay. And a commission delay on an undocumented split is where the dispute quietly starts.
The rental deal is even more exposed
Rental transactions move faster and with even less formality than sales. Unlike property sales — where Form F and brokerage agreement forms enforce a brokerage engagement — many rental deals are concluded based on informal verbal promises, emails, or WhatsApp conversations. This exposes the agent to unnecessary legal and financial risk.
In a rental, the timing is compressed. The tenant views, agrees, signs the tenancy contract, hands over the cheques — all sometimes in the same day. The agent who introduced the tenant expects to be paid from the commission collected at signing. But if the split was agreed verbally, and both agents are from different agencies, and the tenancy commission goes to one agency’s account, the other agent is again dependent on goodwill and a paper trail that may not exist.
Commission for a rental deal is due when the Ejari-registered tenancy contract is signed and the security deposit and first cheque are handed over. That is the trigger — and it is a single, definite moment. That moment should also be when split documentation is already in place, not when both agents start chasing to confirm what was “agreed”.
Post-dated cheques, which remain a core feature of Dubai’s rental market, add another layer. For decades, Dubai’s rental market operated on a system where tenants issued landlords a series of post-dated cheques covering six to twelve months of rent upfront. When a tenant hands over a stack of cheques at signing, the immediate cash in the deal is the commission — and both agents need that commission to be documented and disbursed simultaneously, not sequentially.
What happens when there is no paper trail and a dispute is filed
When a co-broke deal turns into a formal dispute, the process is not quick, and it is not cheap in time or professional goodwill.
If no written agreement exists and a dispute arises, the DLD arbitration system will default to the standard rate. That helps set the commission amount — but it does not automatically resolve who gets paid, in what proportion, from which party. The buyer’s side agent still needs to demonstrate that there was a co-broke relationship, that they introduced the client, and that they are entitled to a share. Without Form I, that case is built on messages, call logs, and testimony. Not every case is won.
Complaints about broker conduct can be raised with the DLD/RERA. The Dubai Land Department regulates registered brokers and handles complaints about unregistered practice, double-dipping, misrepresentation, or fee disputes with a brokerage.
The Rental Disputes Settlement Centre handles landlord-tenant disputes, but the Rental Disputes Centre handles landlord-tenant disputes about the tenancy itself — broker conduct sits with DLD/RERA, though if a commission mess has spilled into the tenancy, the RDC may become relevant too.
Filing a complaint requires documentation. Having a written agreement is essential to win any dispute. That is the end of the road — but by then, the working relationship is usually damaged, the time cost is significant, and the outcome is uncertain.
Off-plan deals: a different shape, same root problem
The commission dynamic in off-plan deals is structured differently, but the informal-agreement problem surfaces in the same way.
In an off-plan sale, the developer pays the agent’s commission — not the buyer. Buyer instalments are paid into a project-specific escrow account held at a RERA-approved bank, never into the developer’s general operating accounts. The regulated escrow account mechanism under Law No. 8 of 2007 means buyer payments are protected and milestone-linked — developers draw escrow funds only against construction progress certified by an independent engineer; rather than taking buyer money upfront, the developer can withdraw from escrow only in stages that match construction milestones.
What this means for agents is that the commission on an off-plan deal is often paid in tranches tied to payment plan milestones, not in a single lump at signing. If two agents co-brokered the introduction — one from the developer’s preferred agency list, one who brought the actual buyer — and the split arrangement was not formalised before the SPA was signed, the agent who registered the deal with the developer controls the commission relationship. The agent who introduced the buyer, without a signed agreement, has no standing in the developer’s process.
When the developer releases a commission tranche six months into construction, the agent who is not registered on the deal file does not get a notification. They do not receive a payment. They receive silence — and then the dispute begins.
The three moments where informal deals quietly become disputes
It is worth naming exactly where the vulnerability sits, because it is rarely one single failure. It is usually a sequence.
Moment one: the split is agreed without being signed. Two agents agree terms on a deal verbally or over WhatsApp. Both feel it is clear. No Form I is executed. The deal continues.
Moment two: something slows between agreement and payment. The deal is signed but not yet completed. The commission is with one agency. The timeline stretches — a mortgage, an NOC, a title deed, a developer payment schedule. The buyer’s agent is waiting.
Moment three: payment is made to one party without a mechanism to disburse to the other. The listing agency receives the commission and processes it internally. There is no obligation, in the absence of a signed Form I, to automatically release a share. The buyer’s agent follows up. The listing side’s accounts team looks for documentation. There is none. The dispute has now started.
None of these moments require bad faith. They require only the absence of a signed agreement at the right moment. That is what makes informal deals structurally unreliable, even between agents who genuinely respect each other.
The Trakheesi layer and why listing agents carry more risk than they think
Form A is filled out via the DLD’s Trakheesi system or RERA’s e-form portal. Submitting for Trakheesi approval generates a permit number. That permit number is what makes a listing legitimate. It is tied to the listing agency.
When a co-broke deal completes, the listing agency — the one with the Trakheesi permit and the Form A — is the entity that receives the commission from the seller or developer. It is also the entity that a RERA audit would look to first when examining whether commission was handled correctly. RERA requires brokerage fees to be agreed in writing and traceable within transaction records. A brokerage reconstructing commission history from scattered spreadsheets, emails, and verbal agreements ahead of a DLD audit is not simply inefficient — it is exposed to compliance findings that a properly documented system would have prevented.
This means the listing agency carries an obligation that many treat as purely administrative. It is not. If a co-broke partner can demonstrate they were owed a share and were not paid, the liability sits with the agency that received and held the commission. The listing agency’s duty is not just to their own agent — it extends to every party in the transaction whose split was agreed but not documented.
VAT adds a layer that informal deals cannot handle cleanly
Since the introduction of VAT in the UAE in January 2018, a 5% Value Added Tax applies to real estate brokerage services. On a sales commission, that means the invoice to the client includes VAT. The agency collects it. The agency remits it.
In a co-broke deal, each agency has its own VAT registration status. Agents must issue VAT-compliant invoices. When a split happens informally — one agency collecting the full commission and then paying the other agency a cash portion or an informal transfer — the VAT treatment of that inter-agency payment is unclear at best and non-compliant at worst. The agency receiving the split share needs a proper invoice from their own entity. That requires a formal agreement to exist in the first place.
This is an area where informal deals create regulatory exposure for both agencies, not just inconvenience between individuals.
What a properly documented deal looks like
The solution is not complicated. It is a process discipline issue, not a technical one.
Before a shared listing or co-broke introduction moves to a viewing — certainly before a client sees terms — the split should be agreed and Form I should be executed. Both agencies should hold a signed copy. The split percentage, the payment trigger (MOU or transfer), and the VAT treatment of the inter-agency payment should all be explicit on the form.
At the point the client pays — whether that is the commission cheque at a secondary market transfer, the first rent cheque at a rental signing, or a developer releasing a commission tranche — both sides should receive their share simultaneously. Not sequentially. Not after internal processing. At the same moment, against the same event.
The commission also needs clarity at the MOU stage. If two agents are involved, the parties should know who pays what and when. Do not leave agency commission to a side conversation.
This principle — that the split agreement should exist before the client pays, and payment to both sides should happen at the same time as the client’s payment — is the single practice change that removes most of the friction described in this article.
It is not about distrust. It is not about complexity. It is about removing the gap between “we agreed” and “we have a signed document” — because that gap is where almost every informal deal dispute lives.
Why the market keeps producing informal deals despite knowing better
Experience alone does not fix the problem. Senior agents with years of closings behind them are just as likely to skip Form I as junior agents — sometimes more so, because they have co-brokered with the same agency many times and feel the relationship makes documentation unnecessary.
The relationship argument is understandable. It is also exactly backwards. The agents who have the most co-broke relationships should be the most rigorous about documentation, because they have the most concurrent deals in flight, the most potential ambiguity about which split belongs to which deal, and the most to lose if one of those relationships sours mid-dispute.
Relying on verbal agreements, not discussing the commission split until late in the process, assuming a 50/50 split without confirmation, and working with agents who refuse to sign Form I are all mistakes that lead to losing commission.
The speed of the Dubai market is a genuine pressure. A buyer who is ready today may not be ready tomorrow. An off-plan launch slot disappears in hours. The temptation to move and document later is real. But “later” in a Dubai real estate deal is a moment that sometimes never arrives — because the transfer completes, the commission is disbursed, and the only thing that arrives late is the dispute.
The principle that ends most disputes before they begin
The common denominator in Dubai commission disputes — across sales, rentals, off-plan, secondary market, single agency and co-broke alike — is almost always the same: something that was agreed informally before the client paid was still informal after the client paid.
The fix is a principle, not a product. Agree the split in writing before the client pays anything. Execute the agreement before the viewing, before the offer, certainly before the Form F. Make payment to every party happen at the same moment as the client’s payment — not days later, not after internal review, not when the accounts team gets around to it.
When the commission is documented before it exists, and distributed at the moment it arrives, there is nothing left to dispute. The question of who is owed what has already been answered, in writing, by everyone involved.
That is what a clean deal looks like. It is also what a market with fewer disputes looks like — and every agent who insists on signing Form I before sharing a listing is helping build it.
