How to work out what admin costs your brokerage

By Keegan Opperman · Published 14 November 2026

To work out what admin costs your brokerage, count the hours each broker spends on admin in a normal week, multiply by the working weeks in a year, then by what an hour of that broker’s time is worth. The sum takes ten minutes and one honest week of counting.

Step 1: which hours count as admin?

Admin is the work that keeps a loan moving but is not advice. For one ordinary week, each broker keeps a tally against the list below, in quarter hours. Choose a normal week, not the best or the worst.

• Returning enquiries. Call-backs and first conversations that only collect details.
• The fact-find. Typing up what the client told you.
• Requesting documents. Writing and sending the list.
• Chasing documents. Every reminder, by phone, text or email.
• Checking documents. Opening each one to see whether it is right and complete.
• Status updates. Telling clients where their application is up to.
• Keeping in touch. Reminders and routine messages to settled clients.

Step 2: how many working weeks are there?

Multiply the weekly hours by the number of weeks the broker works in a year. Forty-eight is a reasonable figure for someone who takes four weeks off.

Step 3: what is an hour worth?

There are two ways to value an hour, and they answer different questions.

• What the broker earns in an hour. Divide what the broker brought in last year by the hours they worked. Use this figure when the hours saved would go back to clients. For a sense of scale, the MFAA’s State of Mortgage and Finance Broking Report 2026 put the median upfront revenue at $126,941 per broker in 2025, before the aggregator’s share and costs (The Adviser).
• What it would cost to pay someone else. This gives a lower figure. Use it when you are comparing admin with the cost of hiring.

What does the sum look like?

The figures in this example are round numbers chosen to show the method. They are not from a survey. Put your own beside them.

Admin hours each week	10
Working weeks in a year	48
Admin hours in a year	480
Value of an hour	$150
Cost of admin in a year	$72,000

In a brokerage with several brokers, do the sum for each broker and add the results.

Step 4: what does it cost to take the work off them?

There are three common ways to move admin off a broker. Put the yearly cost of each beside your own figure.

• Hire an assistant. Ask for the full yearly cost: salary, superannuation, leave and the time it takes to train someone.
• Outsource the processing. Loan processing and virtual assistant services usually charge by the file or by the hour.
• Give the work to an AI employee. Broker Twin’s Starter plan is $199 per user a month, which is $2,388 a year for each user before GST. Phone numbers and call minutes are charged separately. At the example value of $150 an hour, the fee for one user is covered once it gives that broker back 80 minutes a month.

What does the sum leave out?

The hours are only part of the cost. Admin also takes attention away from clients whose loans have already settled. The MFAA report put the median clawback at $11,442 per broker in 2025 (Australian Broker). Clawback has many causes. One of them is a client refinancing elsewhere without calling their broker first.

The savings calculator on our home page does this sum for you. In a demo we go through your own numbers with you, and every brokerage starts with a 30-day free trial.