The Hidden Cost of FM Staffing Broker Markups

If you have ever wondered why a commercial HVAC tech costs your company $145 an hour when the same tech takes home $55, the answer is not complicated. It is a stack of markups, handoffs, and intermediaries, and almost none of it is disclosed on the invoice.

Facility management staffing brokers operate in a pricing model that has not meaningfully changed in two decades. A client pays the broker. The broker pays the staffing agency. The staffing agency pays the recruiter. The recruiter pays the technician. Every layer takes a cut, and every layer calls their cut "operational overhead." By the time the work actually happens, 40-60% of the billed rate has evaporated into the handoff chain.

That number is not invented. It is the figure we publish on our comparison page because it is what the market actually runs. Industry analysts cite similar ranges. Brokers themselves do not dispute it — they just do not put it on the invoice.

Where The Markup Actually Goes

The 40-60% broker markup breaks down into three buckets, and understanding each one is how you separate legitimate service from pure rent extraction.

1. Recruiter Commission (8-15%)

The first cut goes to whoever sourced the technician. In traditional FM staffing, that is usually an external recruiter or an internal sourcing team working on commission. Every hour the tech works, the recruiter earns a residual. On long placements, that residual can persist for the lifetime of the assignment.