Property professionals will face a major shake-up from 1 July, with new AML reporting obligations or risk multimillion-dollar penalties for breaches. Here is how to stay compliant while saving time.
From 1 July, real estate agents, buyer’s agents, conveyancers, and other property professionals will be required to implement formal anti-money laundering (AML) programs, screen customers, and report suspicious activity as part of a broader effort to combat financial crime.
While there is still time to prepare, failure to meet requirements will attract daily fines of $19,500, making the right AML provider essential for agencies.
According to AML Partners founder John Nguyen, the reforms marked a major shift for the real estate industry, with AML laws having existed since 2006 but applying primarily to banks and other financial institutions.
“The biggest change to the industry is actually that now everybody has to screen the customers and essentially do the exact same checks as what the banks have been doing for the last 20 years,” Nguyen said.
Drawing on more than a decade of experience in banking AML compliance, Nguyen launched AML Partners in September 2025 to help real estate professionals navigate the incoming reforms.
“We’ve been helping the big banks Westpac, CBA, ANZ, and Suncorp with their AML compliance for the last 10 years.”
“We knew how difficult it was for the banks to become compliant, and if the banks can’t get it right, what luck does the local real estate agency have?”
From 1 July, Nguyen said property professionals will face a range of new compliance obligations beyond simply screening customers.
“Businesses will need to enrol with AUSTRAC, undertake risk assessments, implement AML programs and appoint compliance officers who will oversee activities and act as the primary point of contact with the regulator.”
“Ongoing obligations will also include annual staff training, record keeping for seven years, independent audits every three years and annual reporting to AUSTRAC.”
Nguyen said the most significant operational change for agencies will be customer screening, with businesses required to verify identities and conduct sanctions.
Additionally, he said that higher-risk customers may also require enhanced due diligence, including evidence of their source of wealth and source of funds.
“People don’t realise the amount of time this is going to take them. If your office is doing a hundred deals, you might have to screen 400 people.”
“With companies and trust, you’re going to have to go and find out everybody who has over 25 per cent beneficial ownership. They all need to be screened alongside all the directors.”
“If you run a trust, you need to go through the trust documents and screen all of the role bearers.”
According to AUSTRAC, failing to comply with the new regulation will result in fines up to $33 million for corporations, $6.6 million for individuals, and imprisonment.
Due to the high stakes of AML regulation, Nguyen said that having the right partner in place will be essential for agencies.
He said that with their decade of experience, AML Partners has positioned itself as a compliance-first business rather than simply another software provider.
According to Nguyen, their platform, FlowAML, was built to remove much of the compliance burden from agencies by handling customer verification, sanctions screening, politically exposed person checks and adverse media searches on their behalf.
“We do a hundred per cent outsourcing. We basically outsource everything from documentation to training to doing the screening. We’re a one-stop shop.”
“And we streamline the process to make sure that everybody is compliant.”
Rather than requiring agents to conduct the checks themselves, AML Partners’ FlowAML solution completes the screening process before providing findings and recommendations back to the agency’s compliance officer.
“We will do all of the screening, and we’ll send the compliance officer back our report.”
Nguyen said the model was designed to help agencies remain focused on serving clients and generating revenue, rather than becoming compliance specialists.
“A lot of clients have been coming to us because they started the real estate agent not to become AML compliance officers. They want to sell property to make money, but obviously, compliance is important as well.”
Additionally, he said the platform also significantly reduced the amount of time agents need to spend on compliance tasks, requiring only basic client and property details before the FlowAML solution takes over the process.
“It doesn’t matter if it’s a simple residential property or a complex trust; agents will only need to spend one to two minutes filling out the first two forms.”
“It’s actually really easy to use.”
Ultimately, Nguyen said that the platform was designed to fit into existing agency workflows with minimal disruption.
“Property professionals don’t need more admin, or another app to get to, they need more time to spend with their clients.”
While the new reforms could appear as a burden, Nguyen has urged networks and agents to take the regulation seriously or cop it.
“AUSTRAC is not your regular regulator. They’re fighting financial crime. They’re very serious. They’re not going to come in and give a $200 fine.”
“What I suspect they’ll do is they’ll basically try to make an example of an organisation that hasn’t registered or they refuse to screen clients.”
Nguyen said that AML compliance was ultimately about preventing criminal groups from using property as a vehicle to disguise illicit funds and move wealth through legitimate markets, with broader implications for communities globally.
“Financial crime affects people on a global scale, and we want to stop these criminal organisations from hiding the wealth and basically creating harm to society.”
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