Should I appoint a sole selling agent or build an in-house team?
Appoint a sole selling agent when you need reach and are willing to give exclusivity for a long term. Build in-house when you have continuous launches to justify salaries. For a finished project with a tail of unsold units, a fixed-window outsourced operation fits better than either — no exclusivity, no headcount, and a defined end date.
Three structures, and they fail in different ways. The right one depends less on your project than on how long the work lasts and how much control you are willing to hand over.
The three structures compared
| Sole selling mandate | In-house sales team | Outsourced operation (99-day sprint) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Typical term | 12–36 months is common in the Indian market | Permanent headcount | Fixed window — 99 days |
| Exclusivity given up | Usually full exclusivity on the project | None | None |
| Cost shape | Commission, often above standard brokerage | Fixed salaries plus incentives, payable regardless of sales | Fixed monthly operating fee for the window |
| Who owns the buyer relationship | The mandate firm | You | You — everything goes out in your project’s name |
| Time to running | Weeks, plus onboarding | Months, including hiring and ramp | Days |
| If it does not work | You are inside the mandate term | You carry the salaries anyway | Crudoimage’s monthly fee is ₹0 |
| Pricing authority | Often shared or pressured | Yours | Yours |
| What happens to existing brokers | Frequently displaced | Unchanged | They stay, on the same commission |
| Continuity when someone leaves | Their staff, their records | Records often live on personal phones | Every call and buyer stored with you |
When each one is genuinely right
- Sole selling mandate. A launch, a large inventory, and a need for distribution reach you do not have. You are buying a channel, and you pay for it with exclusivity and term.
- In-house team. A continuous pipeline of launches. Salaries only make sense when there is always something to sell.
- Outsourced operation. A finished project with a tail. The work is bounded, so the commitment should be too.
The question nobody in this market answers
What happens to the brokers you already have. A mandate frequently displaces the channel partners you spent years building. It is the largest unspoken cost of the structure and almost no firm addresses it in writing. See why brokers don’t push your project and sole selling mandates: pros and cons.
The cost comparison people avoid
Two salespeople on payroll cost you every month whether or not anything sells. A mandate costs you exclusivity for a year or more. Both are real prices; neither is usually quoted next to the other. In-house or outsourced works through it.
Compare it against your own project
Crudoimage runs the whole selling operation on your finished, unsold flats for 99 days. You set the price and you close. If no flat sells, the monthly fee is ₹0. See how the 99-Day Sprint works, or get your project’s numbers.