I am from San Jose, California. I bought a new home last April at it’s listing price directly with the listing agent of that home, who is also a Real Estate/Loan broker. The broker promised to close the deal on that day without opening the house up for any other offers if I agree for her to sale my old home as well. I agreed to sign a Residential Listing Agreement (C.A.R. Form RLA) giving the broker exclusive rights to sell for a 6-month listing period (she later extended the listing period to 1 year without consulting us in advance but that's is another vexing story... ).

In August, she sent me a formal offer letter from an out-of-town agent. We counter-offer and I later verbally accepted a mid-way price. During the negotiation process, my agent found out that she has shown the house for a relative of the buyer, who live in town and thus help her family looking for a house, but she was not the actual buyer. The broker was upset because she wanted to be their buying agent as well so she could get the full 6% commission. On the day I accepted the offer, another relative of the buyer wanted to see the house, so my agent asked me to show the house and talked them into buying it with her for a cash reward certificate. I called the broker later and told her I did not manage to convince the buyer. I have not heard anything from that offer since. I asked her several times what was going on and she claimed that she never heard from the buyer's agent, despite leaving him messages. I asked her for the phone number of the local relative so I can get some feedback, but the broker never got back to me. I finally realized, 5 weeks later, that I have the buyer's agent contact information on the offer letter (C.A.R. Form RPA-CA), so I called. The Buyer’s agent said he was so glad I called since my broker has not answer his messages and his client has kept on asking. I learned that his client is still looking for a house and still interested in mine. But as the market has gone down since then, the buyer would buy my house for 22,500 less than what they had offered before.

I am so upset with my agent. Besides purposely altering the listing contract, failing to follow through with the first offer, costing me the sale of the house and more, she has done very little to market my house. She did listed it with the MLS (at first with no address of the property so people have to contact her, I had to insist she put the address on the listing. We also had to provide the interior pictures of the house for the listing since hers did not do the house justice. Well, no virtual tour, either). She did about two Open Houses but did not advertise them anywhere, despite my request, again, mainly to show it to her own clients. She did send a verbal offer from one of her client for a much lower price, which I did not accept.

My question is:

1) Is she violating the Codes of Ethics by altering the listing contract without discussing with us in advance, knowing that we will sign it in good faith?

2) By purposely neglecting to follow through an accepted offer, causing me to loss the sell of my home, was the broker in violation of the Listing Agreement contract? Can I demand a cancellation of the Listing Agreement and an unconditional release based on this alone?

3) If the initial Buyer was still interested, can I cancel the listing agreement and sell the house immediately using another agent without owning my broker any commission fees, since she has not followed procedure? (The listing agreement has a 120-day safely period to protect her commission.)

Very frustrated. Please help!!

My goodness! She's definitely WAY over the line with several of the different items you mentioned.

I would recommend contacting as many local and state real estate boards/commissions/etc as you can find. I would think that altering papers you had signed alone would be enough to jeopardize her license. Also, is she associated with a "name" agency or is she just operating on her own. If she's with some kind of franchise or company that has a "corporate office" so to speak I'm sure they'd be very interested to hear about her practices, too.

From the sounds of her greediness, I'm sure she'd probably come after you for her commission if the house sells without her involvement, but I would think you'd definitely have a strong case. You could also try threatening that you're going to report her to see if she'll let you out of the contract. If you can get her to release it make sure you get her to sign something that says all previous agreements are null and void and she's forfeiting her right to any proceeds of the sale of this property. You may even have a case against her for damages because of the lost sale.

Let us know what you find out!
Karla in TX