How Rebate Laws Actually Work
Real estate commission rebates — a portion of the agent's commission returned to the buyer or seller at closing — are legal under federal law. The U.S. Department of Justice has actively encouraged them as pro-competitive, and HUD has said they're fine as long as they're disclosed to everyone in the transaction. The restriction, where it exists, comes from state real estate licensing law, not federal law.
There's generally no dollar or percentage cap. In the 41 states (plus D.C.) where rebates are allowed, the amount is simply whatever the brokerage chooses to offer — there's no state-mandated ceiling. Welcome Home Referrals offers 15%, which is higher than most national competitors. The handful of exceptions are about whether a rebate is allowed at all, not how big it can be.
Where cash back doesn't work
Eight states currently prohibit commission rebates outright: Alabama, Alaska, Kansas, Mississippi, Missouri, Oklahoma, Oregon, and Tennessee. Iowa is a special case — rebates are restricted to transactions involving a single licensee, so they're not broadly available there either.
A correction worth knowing about
Louisiana is often still listed online as a no-rebate state. That's outdated — a 2021 opinion from the Louisiana Attorney General found that state law does not actually prohibit consumer commission rebates. We've reflected that correction here, with a note on the Louisiana entry above.