Accepting payments, when you're in the real estate industry, it can be difficult. Why you ask? It's due to risk.

Since a large portion of the real estate industry deal with trades and e-payments, being able to set up a high risk merchant account to accept online credit card payments is tantamount for day-to-day operations. So what happens when you set up a merchant account with the popular payment aggregators like PayPal, Stripe, or Square? Your business may be running smoothly for a little while, but one day you might wake up to find your payment processor has frozen or completely shut down your merchant account. 

Why does that happen? It's because services like PayPal and Stripe process payments in aggregate merchant accounts that are comprised of many different businesses in a variety of industries with alternating levels of risk. Many in the real estate industry set up their merchant account with these payment aggregators because they offer instant approval. But, things change after the underwriting process is over or a customer has filed for a credit card chargeback. For real estate companies, aggregate merchant accounts can only lead to aggravation. What you need is a dedicated high risk merchant account for your real estate business.

A dedicated merchant account is basically a bank account for your business. When a client sends a payment through your online payment portal, the transaction gets approved through a payment gateway provided by your eCommerce platform, and then the funds eventually end up in your merchant account provided by an acquiring bank. In a dedicated merchant account, the acquiring bank will set up an account just for your business alone. To make up for the high risk, however, they will often tack on higher-than-usual processing fees which can take a chunk out of your bottom line. But there are payment processing experts that have relationships with acquiring banks and know the specific needs of those in the real estate industry.