TorontoRealtyBlog

Remember Bram and Mary?

Surely you do.

They were the stars of last week’s blog post!

I will admit that I was rather surprised by the keen interest in not only the story itself, but rather “part two” of the story.

As I joked in the comments section last week, we’ve become so accustomed immediate gratification in all areas of life that we almost forget what it was like to have to wait for something.  For anything.

Case in point: cliffhangers.

I was as much a product of the 1980’s as I was a product of the 1990’s, and despite “Who shot Mr. Burns” in a season-ending episode of The Simpsons taking place during my formative years, the largest cliffhanger in my television-viewing days occurred on April 27th, 1994.

Melrose Place was incredible television viewing, at least, for those that knew what it was.

It was not a soap opera but it had strong elements of one.  It was actually a spin-off of Beverley Hills: 90210, when Kelly dated an older guy, Jake, who became the star of Melrose Place.

There was a villain named “Kimberley” on Melrose Place who we thought had died in a car accident, when a main character, Michael, had been driving drunk.  Kimberley made her miraculous return, much to the chagrin of Sydney, who had been blackmailing Michael, and it seemed that all was well again.

But at the end of the episode, after a passionate and steamy love-making session, Kimberley goes into the bathroom and stares at herself in the mirror, as we TV viewers have no clue what’s about to happen.  To our absolute amazement, she reaches for her head and pulls off her infamous, thick, red hair, and reveals not only that the hair was a wig, but that there’s a massive skull-length scar on her head.

Then the episode ended.

Then we had to wait until September to find out what happened.

I was just about to finish Grade Eight when this episode aired, and the next day at school, everybody was talking about it.

That cliffhanger lasted for months and by the time I learned what happened to Kimberley, I was in high school.

So then, dare I ask, who doesn’t love a good cliffhanger?

The TRB readers, it would seem.

But I’ll try not to do that ever again.

Today’s story is about principles in real estate, which some of you might joke is an oxymoron, but the protagonist of today’s story isn’t a Realtor, but rather a would-be seller.

I am at least seventy-percent certain that I haven’t told this story before, but as with the Bram & Mary tale from last week, I can’t be sure.

In 2010, I received an email from a long-time blog reader, whom I had never met, whom I have still never met, who asked me, “Would you be willing to take on a difficult client?”

Great way to start!

“Jim” and I had been emailing for some time, really just about the market, the blogs I had written, and real estate in general, but Jim admitted to me one day, “I’m in my forever home, so you and I probably won’t do any business, but I appreciate the real estate camaraderie.”

I have a lot of “blog friends” that I email with from time-to-time, so I told Jim not worry.

As luck would have it, Jim eventually emailed to introduce me to his “difficult” friend, “Rob.”

Rob and his family lived in Surry, British Columbia, and were moving to Toronto for work and to start a new life.

Jim put me in touch with Rob over email, and I asked Rob to set up a call.

He emailed back “Sure” and nothing more.  Odd.

I responded and asked for days/times, and he wrote back, “Now.”

A man of few words.  No problem.

I called Rob and before I could spit out, “It’s David Fleming, from Bosley Real Estate,” he interjected and told me something that I had heard before, but which I had never heard with such conviction:

“I fucking hate real estate agents”

We were off to a great start!

I jokingly said, “Trust me, I do too,” which is actually true on most days, and Rob said, “Yeah, well then I guess there’s a non-zero chance we’ll get along.”

I asked Rob, “Can you tell me a little bit about where you are in the search and what your objectives are?”

Rob said, “Wasting no time, eh?  Speaking like a salesperson already, are ya?” and I started to realize what Jim had meant when he said “difficult.”

Rob continued, “Tell ya what, I’m going to explain to you ‘where we are in the search,'” mimicking my question, and then added, “Then you tell me if you’re a principled enough person to not do what our last agent did, okay?”

Oh, wow.

This made sense.

He had already worked with an agent here in Toronto, and from the sounds of it, things didn’t go well!

I told Rob, “I’m all ears,” and Rob proceeded to regale me with a story that simply couldn’t be true, but for which, if it was, then I understood why he was so sour.

Rob and his wife, Michelle, had come to Toronto on two previous occasions to look at real estate with their previous Realtor, who we’ll just call “Abigail.”

They found a House that they really liked and decided to proceed with an offer.

The negotiations went back-and-forth and eventually, they settled on price and terms, and of course, conditions.

The purchase was conditional on a satisfactory home inspection, which Rob and Michelle would not be able to attend, since they were back in Surrey while the deal was being negotiated.

A few days later, Agent Abigail sent a copy of a home inspection to Rob and Michelle and said, “This looks fine to me, let’s firm up!”

Rob felt that this was really rushed, and really improper, given the $3,000,000 price tag of the house (a big number in 2010), and that he was simply relying on an inspection from a person he had never spoken to, whom he didn’t know, that was set up by an agent he had just met.

So Rob decided to do something seemingly crazy: he flew back to Toronto and then called the home inspector directly and asked to meet him at the property.

This was completely unbeknownst to Agent Abigail, not because Rob was being mischievous, but rather because Rob just didn’t know the process.

Rob and the inspector never actually gained access to the home, since that would have required Abigail to set up an appointment.  Rob simply told the inspector, “I want you to explain this inspection to me, and I want to meet you in person to see the whites of your eyes while we do it.”

Rob told me that they literally stood in the driveway of the home talking, and the more Rob asked questions, the more the inspector got uncomfortable.

“I wore this guy down like he was a witness on the stand in a courtroom,” Rob told me.  “And the more questions I asked, the more his story changed.”

His story?  What story?

“Michelle told me over and over that she smelled some funk in that basement.  Something musty.  Something wasn’t right,” Rob told me.

But the inspection noted that there was no evidence of moisture, leakage, or water penetration.

“After an hour, this guy folded like a shitty tent from Canadian Tire,” Rob explained.  “He came clean and begged me not to ruin his life.”

This couldn’t be true.  This had to be exaggerated.

“The inspector told me that Abigail gave him $2,500 to do the inspection and that she ‘expected a solid report.'”  Then he said, “David, how much does an inspection usually cost?”

I told him it was around $400.

“Yeah no shit,” he told me.  “This witch was bribing him,” Rob told me.  “And that house was completely fucked up.”

Before meeting the home inspector, Rob started to investigate and he found that this house had already sold twice before, and fallen through on conditions both times.

He knocked on the door of the neighbours on both sides of the house and while one neighbour was really coy and didn’t want to chat, the other neighbour told him the whole story.

“They had major, major water damage in that basement,” Rob told me.  “The neighbour said that there were trucks in the driveway all summer.”

Perhaps I was naive back then.  Perhaps I’m still naive now.  But the idea that a home inspector would give a favourable inspection for money, and risk his entire career, was unbelievable to me.

I asked Rob, “What was the name of the home inspection company?”

He told me.  I had never heard of them.

I Googled them and nothing came up.

To this day, it remains a mystery, as I have still never heard of this company and it’s like they just disappeared.

Rob said, “Hey, lemme ask you, if you had clients interested in a house, would you share the history of the house and tell them that it had already sold twice before and fallen through both times?”

I said that I would, but I also added that it’s very unlikely that I would show, let alone recommend the purchase of a house that had failed two prior inspections.

Rob said, “Alright, so listen, maybe I don’t hate you…”

Over time, I would learn that this was merely his sense of humour.  Rob wasn’t difficult.  He was just unique.

Rob and Michelle came to Toronto two weeks later and I showed them a few houses.  Rob was interesting.  He was just so unique.  But so am, or at least that’s what people tell me all the time.  I’ve been called “eccentric” which I believe could be a synonym, in this case, for “unique.”  Was it possible that Rob and I were actually going to get along?

On the second trip to Toronto, Rob and Michelle’s children came along.  One night after our last viewing, I saw him interact with them and I realized that he was just like everybody else; he wasn’t a jerk, he wasn’t difficult, but he was just really unique.  Just like me.

Rob was tough.  But Rob was also principled.  And very, very soon, I would learn just how principled Rob was.

I received a call two days after Rob and Michelle returned to Surrey and they said they wanted to make an offer on the last house we had seen.

Since it was 2010, I had to email the offer to Rob and Michelle, have them print it, physically sign it, and then scan and email back to me.

Every time we needed to make a single change, we had to repeat the same process.

The listing agent for this house was one of the top producers in the area and while he too was eccentric, he was incredibly diligent.

He called and asked me a litany of questions about Rob and Michelle, both questions that I could answer, and those that he has absolutely no business asking and no expectation of a response.

One of his questions was, “Have they made any other offers on properties in this area?” to which I paused and said, “Why is that important?”

He said, “I always like to ask, that’s all,” but I remained unsure of his motivations if there were any.

I said, “I have just started working with them and this is the first offer they’ve made with me,” and he accepted that answer and moved on.

The listing agent was a real stickler.  He was tough.  We negotiated this deal for days.

But before we could get to the finish line, I received a very interesting email from somebody I never expected to hear from…

…Abigail.

When I saw her name pop up on my phone – my old Blackberry 8600, I knew it was bad.

The subject line said “Rob & Michelle.”

The body said: “Hi David, thank you for doing my job for me.  I have Rob & Michelle under contract, and when you sell them 123 Fake Street, I expect 100% of the commission.”

My heart was in my throat.

Not only because of this unexpected email, but just the way Abigail chose to write it.  Sarcastic, vindictive, and entitled.

I called Rob and I said, “I just received an email from Abigail and she says she has you under contract.”

Rob laughed.  He said, “That (expletive deleted).”  It was bad.  Too bad for this blog…

“She’s lying to you, young grasshopper,” he said.  “Don’t worry about a thing, just go get this house for me and Michelle and we can send her a Christmas card of my family in front of the house that she didn’t get to sell us.”

Something wasn’t right, so I emailed Abigail back and said, “Can you kindly provide a copy of the Buyer Representation Agreement signed by Rob and Michelle?”

Guess what happened next?

She did.

She emailed me a signed B.R.A. that was dated two months prior and ran for another four months.

I called Rob and told him, and he went ballistic.

“I never signed that,” Rob told me.

I asked him if it was his signature and he said, “Yes, but I mean, I never knowingly signed that.”

Here’s the problem: in 2023, in a situation where a buyer purchases a home through one agent, and a second agent comes out of the woodworks with a signed Buyer Representation Agreement, claiming a commission is owed, the second agent must prove that agency representation was fully explained, that the documents were explained and that the buyer received a copy of the documents and confirmed receipt.

But our story takes place in 2010.

Rob and Michelle had apparently signed a B.R.A. and didn’t know it.

I spoke to our in-house legal counsel at the time and he told me that even if Rob and Michelle signed an affadavit saying that they didn’t know they were under a B.R.A. and that they had never knowingly signed one, or received a copy, that arbitration could side with Agent Abigail.

I explained this to Rob and he was livid.

What’s more, is that we didn’t understand how Abigail came to know what we were doing.

“Hold off on anything to do with the house and the offer,” Rob told me, so I called the listing agent and explained this to him.

“I figured this might be the end result,” he told me.

I asked him what that meant, and he said, “I recognized the names of the buyers from somewhere but I couldn’t quite place it.  Then I happened to run into Abigal at an agent open house and all of a sudden, it clicked.”

So he had a hand in this?

“I met your clients, Rob and Michelle, once before,” he explained.  “They were with Abigail at one of my Sunday open houses, so when they made an offer with you on this house, I was merely doing my due diligence to speak to Abigal and find out with whom they were under contract.”

I suppose he had a valid point.  Yes, he was sticking his nose in other people’s business, but if he was working on behalf of his seller clients, then he would want to ascertain if there were any potential issues with Rob and Michelle, their financing, their agency, etc.

Rob continued to fly off the handle.

“That sleazy shyster shouldn’t be licensed to sell real estate in this business,” he yelled, “Let alone try to hold some bullshit contract over our heads.”

I had a conference call with Rob, Michelle, myself, and our in-house legal counsel, and while our counsel did explain that Abigail could claim she was their rightful representative, Rob was having none of it.

“I’ll call RECO,” he said.

“I’ll call her manager and her broker,” he said.

“This woman is a criminal!  How can she claim she’s our agent?”

Our legal counsel said, “Because she has a piece of paper, signed by you, that says so.”

“It’s not enforceable,” Rob said.

“The only way we’ll know that for sure is after you’ve purchased a house and after Abigail sues for her commission,” our legal counsel said.

Rob was silent.

Eventually, he said, “This contract says I’m stuck with her for another four months, is that right?”

I interjected and said, “That’s correct, Rob.”

He was silent again.  I could feel him thinking through the phone.

Rob slowly began, “Look, I’m a man of principles….”

Then he paused for what still feels like a very, very long time.

“….so if this means that I have to wait four months to buy a home for my family so that this woman doesn’t make a penny off my back, then that’s what I’m going to do.”

I was shocked.

I looked over at our legal counsel, and my manager who had dropped in to listen to the call, and we didn’t know what to say.

I said, “Rob, listen, I want to do what’s best for you and your family.  I don’t care if she’s compensated, it’s not about me, or my brokerage, or our fee.  Let us work something out so that you can get the kids into school in time for the start of the school year…”

But Rob cut me off.

“David,” he sternly said.  “Not a penny.”

He continued, “I’m a man of principles, and I will wait until hell freezes over…”

(TO BE CONTINUED)

The post How Far Will You Go To Protect Your “Principles”? appeared first on Toronto Realty Blog.