John in Realosophy News, HomeBuying
The absence of consumer protection in the real estate industry was one of the main reasons our team started Realosophy. HomeBuyers are the most vulnerable party in the real estate transaction and yet they lacked their own space, a place to come and get educated about issues that matter.
Traditional real estate websites are more focused on getting your e-mail address than they are on educating you about things like fake multiple offers. The websites of provincial real estate authorities such as the Real Estate Council of Ontario (RECO) can be confusing at times, since they are geared to serve realtors rather than consumers.
To illustrate, let's examine how a visit to RECO’s website may leave a buyer feeling a tad alienated.
As you know, we at Realosophy are big advocates of Buyer Representation agreements (also called Buyer Agency agreements). We encourage HomeBuyers to sign a Representation agreement with their agent because if they don’t sign one, their agent is legally obligated to represent the best interests of the seller, not them.
RECO also talks about Representation agreements on their website, raising the following question: what if I don’t sign one? Interestingly, RECO doesn’t tell consumers that the HomeBuyer’s agent would be legally obligated to represent the best interests of the seller. Instead, they offer this:
The Code of Ethics clearly states that loyalty ultimately rests with the client and that a broker or salesperson must protect and promote the clients best interests.
Most buyers reading this would probably conclude at this point that even without a Representation agreement, the salesperson (a.k.a the agent) I'm working with is ultimately loyal to me, the client, and must protect and promote my best interests. So why sign on a dotted line?
It appears that a little information service start-up called Realosophy is diverging from the expert advice set-out by our provincial regulator RECO by insisting that buyers adhere to a stronger standard - so who's right?