Legal Question in Real Estate Law in California

There is no specific duty to disclose to you that he was doing a double escrow. However, it was completely illegal for him to represent you in a transaction in which he was the legal seller as between you and the buyer. It was also illegal to document the transaction as a sale from the seller to you if he owned the property even for five seconds before it was transferred to you. Without knowing his agreement with the seller, I can't say for sure if his transaction with the seller was illegal, but he absolutely breached his fiduciary duty to you by representing you in a transaction where he was legally the one selling to you, and in not disclosing to you that you could have bought the property directly from the seller at a lower price. As your broker he was absolutely legally obligated to get the house for you at the price he paid the seller. Failure to do so was a seriously dirty move, not to mention trying to dodge his obligations as seller by making it look like you were buying from the seller instead of from him. I would be MORE than happy to talk to you at one of my Sacramento area conference facilities about taking action against this broker. He should not be in business.