Estate agents come in for plenty of unfair criticism on social media and the latest dispute has raised questions over whether they are benefiting from rising house prices but doing the same amount of work.

Prominent personal finance journalist Paul Lewis has pondered on his Twitter feed: “House prices rise again. Estate agent get paid a %age of sale price. Same work, more money. Are they responsible for falling productivity?”

The debate rests on whether estate agents profit from rising house prices as they can get higher commissions for the same amount of work.

So far he has received 24 retweets and 22 likes and drawn comments, with one user @AlisonClemesha claiming “Estate agents do naff all for their money in my experience.”

Some have taken the opportunity to highlight fixed fee online agents such as YOPA.

Other more sensible comments have come from property commentator Henry Pryor who points out that “agents don’t set the price, u pay them to negotiate the best price.”

One user @JohnRed33 has pointed out that estate agent commissions would go down if property prices fell.

Thankfully one reader continues to fly the flag for EYE. Chris Wood of PDQ Property highlights that sold prices are up but transaction numbers are down, while average fees have dropped. He even links to recent data on EYE from My Home Move’s Stephen Hayter.

You can follow the thread here