Legal Question in Real Estate Law in Illinois
Real Estate Agents Fiduciary Responsibility
Before going to market in 2007 with a newly rehabbed million $ home, I asked my agent to reach out to 3 other high producing agents in order to validate his proposed list price. His proposed list felt high considering the product and the market, but I wasn't connected to the market as well as he was. A week later he came back to me and confirmed that the 3 agents gave 3 prices ranging from his proposed price to 25k above. The market continued to turn and we put the house on about 4% lower than his suggested, but used the input from the other 3 agents as heavy influence. The product didn't move and I later found out after reaching out to one of the agents he claimed he got feedback from that the other agent never gave feedback. My agent was lying about this agent as well as the other 2. He never received any feedback on the pricepoint. I called him out on it and he hung up on me and claimed that he did what he said. He was lying again. I feel betrayed as I put a lot of faith in this agent's pricing suggestion and now I have a product sitting on the market that we have since dropped an additional 11% from the actual original list and 15% from his original suggested. Do I have any recourse on this agent or the agency he represents?
2 Answers from Attorneys
Re: Real Estate Agents Fiduciary Responsibility
Dear Sir or Madam,
Any complaints against an agent or broker can be pursued by going to the Illinois Dept. of Financial and Profesional Regulation at http://www.idfpr.com/dpr/default.asp
Re: Real Estate Agents Fiduciary Responsibility
He should not have represented anything other than truth to you but, as far as recovering financially, you are probably not going to have any luck. You can report him to the regulatory offices as suggested by the prior answer but that will probably be the end of it. Pricing is a very shaky thing on a good day - it is not set in stone. But you do have a right to truthfulness from your agent