The gender pay gap between men and women across the UK’s property agents has barely improved since last year, with BNP Paribas Real Estate ranked as the agent with the biggest pay disparity, EG analysis can reveal.
In total, the gender pay gap across the sector averaged out at 35% for 2018, improving by just two percentage points since last year, when it was revealed women’s pay on average was 36.5% lower than their male peers.
EG has analysed gender pay gap data from 11 agents to see whether the sector has made any progress in closing its mean pay gap (the percentage difference between the average male and average female pay packets).
The pay gap does not show that women are paid less than their equivalent male counterparts but does show that women’s average pay is lower than men’s across the sector.
Widening disparity
Four agents reported that their gender pay gaps had worsened this year: BNP PRE; Cushman & Wakefield; Montagu Evans; and CBRE.
BNP PRE was identified as having the worst pay gap in its sector. On average, women’s pay packets are 50% lower than men’s across the whole of the business.
Explaining its disparity, BNP PRE said this is due to a low proportion of women (18.6%) occupying senior positions, while most of the lowest paid roles (78%) are held by female members of staff.
Similarly, at Montagu Evans a greater proportion of women hold lower-paid positions than men, while men continue to dominate middle and senior positions.
Cushman & Wakefield decided to include its partners in its gender pay gap reporting this year, which as a result has increased its original mean pay gap from 35.7% in 2017 to 35.8% in 2018.
Factors impacting CBRE’s pay gap widening include the payment of several long-term incentive plans following previous mergers and acquisitions.
Despite this, CBRE still remains the agent with the smallest pay gap in the sector, followed by Knight Frank, which reported that women are paid 28.8% less than men on average.
Greatest reduction
Countrywide has seen the largest gender pay gap reduction this year, managing to lower its mean pay difference between men and women by 39.7%, from 54.2% in 2017 to 32.66% in 2018.
According to its report, this has been largely down to two factors. In the surveying entity, the pay gap has reduced from 63.35% to 60.59% in 12 months, and in the Lambert Smith Hampton division the gap has decreased from 49.71% to 44.43% over the same comparable period.
Meanwhile, Colliers International has reported the worst mean gender bonus gap at 80.5%, followed closely by Savills (79%).
Cushman & Wakefield has reported the smallest bonus gap at 33.3%.
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