Does the Office of Fair Trading protect real estate consumers?

I have long been of the opinion that the Office of Fair Trading (NSW) is a toothless tiger. Many professional and ethical real estate agents spend a great deal of time and money ensuring their compliance with the various Acts under which they operate, while some pretty shoddy ones keep flying underneath the radar.

It is my belief that consumers have some degree of protection from under-quoting of auction price expectations and also dummy bidding but in my opinion this is due to the attention given the topic by the media combined with the fact that large auction-oriented franchises and agents do not want to be made examples of.

I believe that the vast majority of real estate agents wish to do a good job and operate ethically. However, there remain others who do not do their profession proud. If they are doing anything wrong that does not come under the auction umbrella, it seems unlikely to me that they will taken to task by the Office of Fair Trading. Maybe they just don’t have the resources…

The best chance a consumer has is to level the playing field and engage their own professional to act on their behalf – a buyers’ agent of course!!

For more information on how a buyers' agent can help you: www.gooddeeds.com.au

Agents have a saying – buyers are liars…

When I tell this to my clients they are all invariably shocked. But aren’t real estate agents the ones you can’t trust? When was the last time you told an agent how much you had to spend, or how much you were prepared to bid to on an auction property. Buying and selling real estate is often a game of bluff – with buyers and vendors agents facing off and second-guessing each other. Just for something different – try being honest with the next real estate agent you deal with and see if that improves the quality of information you get from them.