Do I pay anything if my house does not sell?

The fee follows the agreement

There is no general rule that decides this. Your agency agreement names the event that earns the fee, and that wording governs. Read it before you sign rather than after a campaign that did not land.

Three clauses are worth finding while you are there. The first is the event that earns the fee. The second is whether anything is payable if you withdraw the property part way through a term. The third is what happens if you sell privately during the term, because on a sole agency that can still trigger the fee depending on how the clause is written.

Section 126 of the Real Estate Agents Act 2008 sits behind all of this. An agency has no entitlement to commission or expenses unless there is a written agency agreement signed by you and the agent, so anything claimed has to be traceable to a clause you signed.

Costs that are yours either way

Marketing is charged separately from the fee. Photography, floor plans, the portal listings, signage and print are bought and used during the campaign, so they are spent whether or not a buyer turns up. Whether that is invoiced up front, during the campaign, or deducted at settlement is a term you agree before anything is booked, and it is the term that decides what an unsold campaign actually costs you.

The same goes for preparation. Repairs, trades, cleaning, gardening and hire furniture for staging are all paid regardless of the outcome, although repairs and a tidy garden are not wasted if you relist later or stay put.

If the campaign ends without a sale

Withdrawing part way through a term and letting the term run out are not the same thing. Withdrawing can trigger a clause about expenses, and in some agreements about the fee, so read what your agreement says about withdrawal before you ask for the property to come off the market. Letting the term finish normally costs nothing further, and the marketing simply stops on the date in the agreement.

Ask for a final marketing invoice at that point, set against anything already paid, so you have one settled number for what the campaign cost. If you might relist later, ask what happens to the photography, the floor plan and the video, because material you have paid for can often be used again and reshooting in a different season is a fresh cost.

One obligation outlives the agreement: a fee can still be payable if you sell to a buyer that agency introduced, for a period after the agency ends, and you are entitled to the list of those names on cancellation, both of which are set out in cancelling a listing agreement.