Am I being unrealistic?

This is what concerns me about the idea of a BA in general.
The whole situation is a conflict of interest since their reward comes from getting you to buy any property at all, which conflicts with the idea of actually holding off until they find something that is right for you which will come at their expense.

 

Yeah but that's a pretty unfair criticism imo because the same could be said of lots of professional services.

Its like saying the idea of a private doctor is a conflict of interest since they would benefit in you being sick for longer and needing more treatment.

 

I disagree with that statement.

Does a real developer become a developer once theyve designed the house, or an investor once they've manage properties themselves? ??delegate delegate delegate. Same end result just different path!

 

To me it seems you are very capapble of buying yourselves. You ask all the right questions and don't allow emotions to take over. I wonder whether you are paying 10K when you don't need to. What worries me is that BA's are taking over the world. Some are very good, sure. I have in mind one or two I would approach if I ever needed to. But it's definitely something you can do yourselves. Write up your checklists and get on with the search.
I also think you should at least provide clues as to who BA is. A lot of fluffing of feathers on the forum - I'm sure that's not the best use of the forum. Rather, let's get real.

 

If it was a valuation by a valuer i dont blame the ba for giving your money back. The tyre kickers must do their head in

 

Dont forget asking an agent about an off market deal is never going to get their approval

 

Why is that if you don't mind me asking?

I have personally seen an off market deal, proposed by a BA, that sold for 45k less than the vendors were originally asking pre market.

 

Are you willing to give us which quarter of Melbourne you were looking in?
Nth? Sth? East or West?

 

Should always make sure you get referrals from actual clients, not just take referrals from 'business associates' who have never actually used the persons services. Sorry you had this experience, but glad it all worked out well for you in Brissie!

 

How would you do that though? Any BA would only give you referrals from clients they think were happy with their service.

 

West

 

You can start by asking people on this forum who have actually used the BA's services to tell you about their experience, can be done via PM to keep confidential.

 

I think it is a hard one, especially when the market is hot and there are a lot of demand. All BAs would just want to get you buy a house quickly so they can move on to the next interstate investors.

Also in terms of pricing, when the market is hot, people tend to overpay. Look at Sydney, everyone has been overpaying just about every Sydney property in the last 3 years.

 

Let's put this in perspective as to what's really happened here.

The purchaser engaged a BA. The purchaser and the BA disagreed on the value of a property. The BA is buying property in the area all day, every day, the purchaser is on the other side of the country.

The purchaser does or says some things which offend the BA. The BA goes offline for a day or so to process this.

The BA decides they don't want to deal with this person. They cancel the exclusive agreement with the client and refund the engagement fee in full.

The purchaser is now free to engage another BA or purchase directly themselves. Had the BA not chosen to cancel the agreement, the purchaser would be obligated to pay the BA even if they sourced a property themselves, probably for a period of 90 days.


Clearly there's been some sort of conflict here and we're only hearing one side of the story. I can't say who's right or wrong in the initial conflict, that's likely to be extremely subjective.

What is fairly clear however is that once the BA decided that the business relationship wasn't going to work, they terminated the agreement and refunded the purchaser in full. The BA could have simply strung the purchaser along until the end of the engagement period and kept the engagement fee.

Both have lost time to this episode, the BA has also likely done a reasonable amount of work to get to the point where they're recommending just the first property.

By any reasonable measure the BA has behaved fairly and ethically, even though the outcome wasn't what anyone wanted. The purchaser has made a complaint on a public forum and almost directly identified the BA.


In the real world people don't get along 100% of the time. At least in this case the conflict was resolved in a reasonably quick manner and probably in the fairest way possible for the purchaser. @Realist35 you should probably put this behind you and move on.

 

Thanks for your comment Peter.

If not agreeing with BA's valuation is offensive, then I would agree with you that I have offended them. But would you say that politely stating that a house is overvalued is offensive?

Further I don't think I have identified the BA. There are many BA's who operate in all quarters of the city, North/south/east/west.

I agree it was nice of the BA to return my fee. However I would also say it was expected. Are they not supposed to return the fee if a client doesn't agree on one, and I repeat, on only one valuation?

I have already put this behing me and engaged another BA to start the search. During our initial conversation I specifically asked what would happen if I disagree with their valuation. They said that if I disagree with 2-3 valuations, and all of those recommended properties sell at a price recommended by them, then we would need to have a conversation to clarify criteria. To me that was a very reasonable and fair answer. They didn't say "if you think my offer was overvalued, I'm gonna cancel our contract and I'm done with you".

 

I don't know what the BA found offensive, you indicated that you upset them. It's probably a bit more than just a disagreement on the value of a property.

Regardless, be happy that you've been able to move on from a sour relationship with a minimum of fuss. Nobody's going to feel good about how this went, but there's better things ahead.

 

Over what period of time where the two deals presented?

 

3 weeks