Agent fined for 'disgraceful' behaviour

Ronika Chand and husband Paul Martin listed their property in Auckland using Trade Me. Photo / Christine Cornege

A real estate agent who found a house for sale on Trade Me and helped the owner to sell it without explaining that she was an agent tried to sue the woman for commission.

But Rita Charles' case was thrown out of court and a Real Estate Agents Disciplinary Tribunal has found her actions "disgraceful".

The homeowner, Ronika Chand, said stress from the 2-year battle with Ms Charles aggravated her irritable bowel syndrome and affected her pregnancy.

Ms Chand had the Clover Park, Manukau, property listed for private sale on Trade Me. In late February 2009, she was told Ms Charles wanted to view the house.

The agent took along a couple and they indicated interest in buying the $300,000 house.

Ms Chand said Ms Charles returned later in the day with a blank Sale and Purchase Agreement and, following negotiations, it was signed by both parties on March 2, 2009.

Several days later, Ms Charles rang Ms Chand and asked her to sign a real estate agent's listing authority but she declined, saying she and her partner had advertised the property on Trade Me to make a private sale.

However, when she viewed the agreement with her lawyer, new information had been inserted, including stamps and a sticker indicating commission was payable to Haron & Company, a real estate agency in Papatoetoe. The commission rates were 4 per cent on the first $300,000 and 2 per cent thereafter.

The sale agreement was for $295,000 and Ms Chand said if she had known Ms Charles was acting as an agent entitled to a commission, she would have increased the price.

In February last year, after Ms Chand refused to pay, Ms Charles tried to get the money through the Manukau District Court but Judge Peter Spiller dismissed the claim.

Ms Chand, who has since moved to Hamilton, then laid a complaint about Ms Charles with the Real Estate Agents Authority.

Ms Charles told a disciplinary tribunal in June this year that she asked Ms Chand to sign the listing authority before presenting her with an offer on the house.

She said Ms Chand declined, but inquired about her commission rates and indicated she could pay only $10,000.

Ms Charles took this to mean Ms Chand understood she was an agent and that she knew a commission would be due for the introduction to the buyers. She also insisted the details of her employer were on the sale agreement when it was signed by the parties, but under cross-examination she contradicted herself on this point in front of Judge Spiller.

Ms Charles said she no longer held a salesperson's licence and was working for an insurance firm.

The tribunal said that while it considered Ms Chand to have acted naively in not making some inquiry about the "bone fides" of Ms Charles, it preferred her evidence to that of the agent.

It called Ms Charles' behaviour disgraceful and fined her the maximum of $750.

Previous cases

David Beiszer: Posted abusive Facebook comments.
Lindsay Dodd: Suspended after his ex-wife accused him of $1 million loan-document forgeries.
Joe Brankin: Allegedly called office manager "a f****** looney, a load of s***, f****** fat thing".
Aaron Little: Convicted of aggravated burglary, failed in an appeal against licence rejection.

Source: Real Estate Agents Authority past cases