In this article
Kooky
Builder of Shaka, the payment router that pays every agent their commission on closing date.
About Kooky and Shaka →Anyone who buys a home in Queensland from Wednesday 1 July 2026 will be asked to prove their identity to the real estate agency handling the sale. That is the date on which Australia's anti-money-laundering and counter-terrorism financing regime extends to real estate agents, conveyancers, lawyers and accountants, according to AUSTRAC, the federal agency that supervises it.
The checks apply to every buyer and every seller, not to those under suspicion. The Real Estate Institute of Queensland set out how its members should run them in a toolkit dated 16 June 2026. For most people buying a home with their own savings and a bank loan, the change is one extra step early in the sale: showing photo identification, and answering a few questions an agent has never had to ask before.
What changes on 1 July
Banks, casinos and remittance businesses have had these obligations for years. The professions that handle property transactions have not. AUSTRAC's summary of obligations for the newly covered sectors, which it calls tranche 2, gives 1 July 2026 as the day regulation begins for them. A business must enrol with AUSTRAC within 28 days of providing a regulated service, which makes 29 July 2026 the enrolment deadline for those trading from day one.
The same AUSTRAC summary lists what a regulated business must do. It must have a written program that assesses its money laundering and terrorism financing risks, approved by senior management, with a compliance officer appointed. It must carry out customer due diligence, the regulator's term for identifying a customer and checking them against sanctions lists and lists of politically exposed persons. It must report suspicious matters, report any transaction involving A$10,000 or more in physical currency, and keep its records for at least seven years.
Related readA median-income Queensland household can afford 9 per cent of homesThe compliance firm VinciWorks, in a note published on 1 July, cites an AUSTRAC estimate that more than $1 billion is laundered through Australian property each year. That estimate is the reason the regulator gives for bringing the sector in. The Real Estate Institute of Western Australia, in guidance to the public issued the same day, tells agents to explain the checks to clients in plain terms: they are legal requirements imposed by the Australian Government.
Who checks the buyer, and when
A sale involves several regulated businesses, and a buyer may be asked by more than one of them. The REIQ toolkit explains where the selling agency's duty begins. For a selling agent, the seller is the customer from the appointment. The buyer becomes the agency's customer for these purposes when the contract of sale is signed.
That timing would be awkward if identification had to be complete before pen touched paper. The rules allow for it. According to the toolkit, an agency may delay its initial due diligence on the other party to the transaction, which for a selling agent means the buyer, until the earlier of two dates: 28 days after the exchange of contracts, or at least three days before the agreed settlement date. The delay is available only where the agency has decided, on reasonable grounds, that it is needed to avoid interrupting the ordinary course of business and that the risk of doing so is low.
A buyer who has engaged a buyer's agent is in a different position. The toolkit says the buyer is that agent's customer from the appointment itself, made in Queensland on a Form 6 or Form 6a, so the check comes at the start of the search and not at contract.
Related readWho is buying Queensland homes? NAB survey counts owner-occupiers first- Offer acceptedThe contract of sale is signed. For the selling agency, the buyer is now a customer under the law.
- Identity requestedThe agency asks for full legal name, date of birth and home address, shown on government photo identification.
- ScreeningThe details are checked against sanctions lists and lists of politically exposed persons.
- Further questions if neededFor a company or trust, the people behind it. For a higher-risk sale, where the money comes from.
- Deadline before settlementWhere the check was delayed, it must be done within 28 days of exchange or three days before settlement, whichever is earlier.
At auction the sequence is the same. The toolkit states that the rules applying to auctions are effectively those governing private treaty sales, with the normal steps carried out at the fall of the hammer.
What a buyer is asked to provide
For an individual, the toolkit lists full legal name, date of birth and residential address, verified through government photo identification. The agency then screens the name against sanctions and politically exposed person lists. A politically exposed person is someone who holds, or has held, a prominent public position, and the term extends to close associates. Being one is not an accusation. It means the business must take more care.
Buyers who are not individuals are asked for more. The requirements vary with who is buying.
| Buyer | What is checked |
|---|---|
| An individual | Name, date of birth and address on government photo identification, then sanctions and politically exposed person screening. |
| A company, trust or partnership | The same checks on each ultimate beneficial owner: any person who owns or controls 25% or more. |
| Someone acting for the buyer | Proof of authority, such as a power of attorney or an executor's appointment. |
| Any buyer in a higher-risk sale | The source of the funds, for example savings, an inheritance or equity in another property. |
REIQ anti-money-laundering toolkit for members, 16 June 2026.
Trusts are common among Queensland families and small businesses, and the toolkit asks agents to take care with them. It warns that complex trust deeds and layered company structures can be hard to interpret and that an agency may need qualified outside help. Where ownership looks deliberately obscured, the matter is to be escalated and may call for enhanced due diligence.
When questions about money are asked
Most buyers will not be asked to document where their deposit came from. The toolkit reserves source-of-funds checks for higher-risk transactions, where the agency must understand and verify where the money originated so that it can be satisfied the funds are legitimate.
It gives agents examples of what should raise questions. Two of them concern buyers directly: funds arriving from several accounts, or from overseas accounts, without a clear reason; and a deposit or purchase money paid by someone other than the buyer.
Related readBuilding regulator maps Queensland's defect hotspots, region by regionThat second example covers a situation that is perfectly ordinary in Queensland, where parents often help adult children with a deposit. Help from family is not prohibited and is not in itself suspicious. It is, though, the kind of arrangement an agency may now ask a buyer to explain and to support with paperwork. Buyers moving money from abroad, including Australians returning home and migrants bringing savings with them, can expect the same.
Maria Edwards, chief executive of the Real Estate Institute of the ACT, wrote in Australian Property Investor magazine on 29 May that straightforward residential sales should see relatively minor disruption, while purchases involving overseas entities or unusual arrangements may take longer.
If a buyer does not cooperate, or is checked twice
The law does not let an agency force a buyer to hand over documents. What it does is set out what the agency must do if a buyer will not. According to the toolkit, an agency that has taken all reasonable steps to establish a customer's identity, has recorded those steps and the difficulties it met, and has considered whether a suspicious matter report is required, is taken to have complied with its obligation.
A buyer will not be told if such a report is made. The toolkit reminds agents that disclosing that a report has been, or may be, lodged is an offence, known as tipping off, and that the restriction applies even if the agency stops acting.
Being asked twice is likely. The buyer's conveyancer or solicitor is a regulated business too, with its own customer to identify. The toolkit says an agency can potentially rely on checks completed by another tranche 2 business, such as a lawyer or another agent, but it stays responsible, must be satisfied the other firm has appropriate measures in place, and must keep evidence that relying on it was reasonable. In the first weeks, many firms may prefer to run their own.
Related readQueensland buyers are gloomier than those in states where prices fallCopies of identity documents are kept for seven years
The REIQ toolkit says all assessment information must be retained for seven years, stored securely, protected from unauthorised access, loss or tampering, and limited to the staff who need it. A buyer handing over a passport or licence can reasonably ask how the copy will be stored.
Who pays, and the industry's concerns
The cost of running the checks falls first on the businesses. The toolkit tells agencies they may pass technology and compliance costs on to their clients through the appointment form, with the amount stated inclusive of GST. It acknowledges that pricing the check on the other side of the sale is harder, because the future buyer is unknown when the seller appoints the agent, and suggests fees may need to vary between individuals, companies and trusts. Whether buyers are charged at all, and how much, is left to each agency.
The REIQ has supported the aim of the law while questioning its weight on small firms. In evidence to a Senate committee reported by Elite Agent in November 2024, the institute's chief executive, Antonia Mercorella, said most Queensland agencies were small independent businesses, often with fewer than five staff. The REIQ then estimated compliance would cost the state's property industry about $250 million a year. That estimate was made before the final rules were settled and has not been tested against experience.
The regulator's position, as VinciWorks summarises it, is that enrolment is not optional: AUSTRAC has signalled it will pursue businesses that keep providing regulated services without enrolling after the deadline.
What comes next
The first fixed date is 29 July 2026, the enrolment deadline for businesses that were already providing regulated services on 1 July. After that, the obligations are continuing ones: annual compliance reports to AUSTRAC, and an independent evaluation of each business's program at least every three years.
For buyers, the practical effect will show in contracts signed from today. A contract signed in the first week of July with a 30-day settlement brings the three-days-before-settlement deadline forward of the 28-day one, so an agency that delays its check has a little under four weeks to finish it. Buyers who have their identification ready, and who can explain a gifted deposit or an overseas transfer in a sentence and a document, are unlikely to notice much more than a new form.
Kooky, from Shaka
Kooky edits Queensland Estate and builds Shaka, the payment router he made for Queensland property professionals. One payment comes in, and every agent, agency and party in the deal receives their signed share on closing date.
