Female brokers at 27%, the same number since 2017.

About 27% of mortgage brokers in Australia are women, and that number has not moved since 2017. Across eight years of record growth, record settlements and record broker numbers, the gender composition of the workforce has stayed flat. The data points to a retention problem, not a recruitment one: women are joining broking, they are just not staying at a rate that shifts the ratio.

The bottom line: Broking draws from a talent pool that is majority women yet sits at 27% female, a number stuck for eight years. FinTalent reads that as an attraction and retention question, not a performance one, because the women who enter and stay in broking consistently outperform.

Yesterday was International Women’s Day. The industry showed up for it. Aggregators, lenders, industry bodies. Recognition matters, and it was good to see.

But there is a number we all need to sit with today. 27%.

That is the percentage of mortgage brokers in Australia who are women. According to the Deloitte Access Economics Value of Mortgage and Finance Broking 2025 report, that figure has not moved since 2017. Eight years. Record industry growth, record settlements, record broker numbers. And the gender composition of the workforce has stayed the same.

What do the numbers behind the headline say?

The MFAA’s 19th Edition Industry Intelligence Service report, the most recent available, covers April to September 2024. It recorded 3,746 female brokers out of a total population of 22,265. That is 26.8%. Female broker numbers grew by 199 over the prior period, a 5.61% increase, but the overall population grew faster. Women are joining. They are just not joining at a rate that changes the ratio.

The FBAA tells a slightly different story. Their 2025 Broker Density Report puts the split at 70/30 male to female, an improvement from 72/28 in 2024. The discrepancy with the MFAA figure comes down to different data collection methods, but both sources confirm the same trajectory. Incremental gains that have not yet closed the gap.

There is one detail in the MFAA data worth noting. In that same reporting period, female broker recruitment declined 6.46% year on year. Male recruitment declined only 1.05%. The pipeline of women entering broking may be softening rather than strengthening. And this is happening while the industry is growing.

If the talent pool is majority women, why is broking 27%?

Now compare that with where most of your candidates are coming from. Banking is 54% female. CBA’s workforce is 56% women. Westpac is 54%. ANZ is 51%. The broader Australian financial services sector is 53% female according to WGEA’s 2024/25 data.

So the talent pool that feeds the broker channel is majority women. But the broker channel itself is 27% women. That gap is worth thinking about. Women are present in financial services. They are qualified. They have the lending knowledge, the client relationships, the compliance understanding. And somewhere between banking and broking, the industry is losing them. It is the same banker-to-broker pipeline behind where new brokers come from, just viewed through who actually makes the leap and stays.

This is where it becomes a recruitment question rather than a diversity conversation. Every major aggregator now runs a banker to broker transition program. AFG, Connective, LMG, Finsure. Yet none of them publish gender disaggregated data on those transitions. We do not know how many of the bankers making the switch are women, or whether women transitioning have different retention outcomes. It would be useful information to have.

Is this a recruitment or a retention problem?

MFAA CEO Anja Pannek has been direct about where the real challenge sits. Retention, not recruitment, is the issue. Connective confirms that female brokers have shorter average tenure in the industry compared to male counterparts. One older data point from the MFAA’s own records is worth noting, even if the picture may have improved since. In the six months to September 2021, 480 female brokers were recruited, but only 40 net new female brokers remained after accounting for those who left. Recruitment was not the problem. Retention was.

The commission only income structure sits at the centre of this. On one hand, it eliminates the structural gender pay gap entirely. In an industry where the broader financial services sector carries a 21.4% gender pay gap according to WGEA, broking’s commission model means everyone gets paid the same regardless of gender. That is a genuine competitive advantage for attracting female talent, and it is one of the real advantages of the commission-only model.

On the other hand, commission only income creates acute risk for anyone managing personal responsibilities. No employer funded parental leave. Upfront income drops to zero during any extended absence. Trail commissions provide some buffer, but for newer brokers with small trail books, the financial pressure is real. The flexibility of broking is marketed heavily. The financial vulnerability of the early years is not.

What does this mean for hiring?

For brokerage owners reading this, the recruitment angle is worth considering. Women who enter and stay in broking perform. FBAA former MD Peter White AM stated publicly that while women represent 30% of the industry, they represent a larger percentage of higher performing brokers. At the 2025 Australian Mortgage Awards, Katie Thomas won both the NAB Broker of the Year Regional and the Westpac Australian Broker of the Year, the night’s most prestigious award. She has since taken the number one spot for Australia’s highest performing resi broker in 2025.

The data shows us this is not a performance issue. It is an attraction and retention question. And if your candidate shortlists are consistently skewing male, it is worth asking whether that reflects the actual talent available or whether the way roles are structured and marketed is filtering women out before they even apply.

For candidates considering the switch, particularly women in banking roles right now, broking offers something the banks genuinely cannot. Flexibility, no pay ceiling, no structural pay gap, and the ability to build a business around your life rather than the other way around. That proposition is real. But so is the reality of building a commission based income from zero, and doing it in an industry where the support structures for women in their first two years are still developing.

The industry has programs. The MFAA and COSBOA launched She Means Business. Finsure offers $15,000 scholarships targeted at women. Connective’s Empower Community has over 1,180 members. These are genuine efforts and they matter. The question is whether programs on their own can shift a number that has stayed at 27% for eight years, or whether the underlying economics of entry need to be part of the conversation too.

Yesterday was about celebration. Today is about looking at the numbers honestly. They have not changed yet. But knowing that is the first step toward changing them. If the composition of the industry is going to shift, the scales will not balance themselves. It probably starts with things like onboarding that accounts for the financial reality of commission only income, mentoring that goes beyond the mandatory two years, and honest conversations about what the first 18 months actually look like. Not just the flexibility highlight reel.