The 6% commission was supposed to die after the lawsuit. It hasn’t. A historic court settlement earlier this year was billed as the beginning of the end for traditional real estate commissions. The idea: give buyers and sellers more flexibility and force fees lower. Fast forward a few months—commissions are still hovering at 5–6%. Why? Because legal rulings don’t erase decades of industry habits overnight. Entrenched practices, consumer inertia, and the MLS system keep the old structure alive. Into that gap steps Ridley, a Colorado AI startup promising to “do what the courts couldn’t.” They tout $150M in listings since July, average savings of $25K per seller, and an AI-guided pricing model. It makes a slick story—Instagram rants turned into a waitlist of agents and viral headlines. But let’s apply some brakes: • $150M sounds big… until you remember Denver-area MLS volumes are in the billions. • “Savings” are benchmarked against the full 6%—ignoring that plenty of agents already discount. • AI-guided pricing? We’ve had Zillow’s Zestimate for years, with mixed results. The bigger lesson isn’t that commissions are about to vanish tomorrow. It’s that consumer frustration creates a wedge for alternatives. Courts didn’t topple the model, but startups are probing the cracks. Disruption doesn’t always happen fast. But it does start with pressure points—and those pressure points tend to be wherever the customer feels overcharged and underserved. The lawsuit rattled the door. Ridley is testing the hinges. https://lnkd.in/e4btyZhz