In real estate, we deal in a lot of gray areas and are privy to a lot of information during a transaction. A question I get a lot from agents is, “What is the right thing to do?”
For example, maybe you’re a listing agent, you receive a contract from a buyer’s agent, and they forgot to check the box for the home warranty or for the inspection. You know they meant to do it, but it benefits your seller if nothing changes. In gray situations like that, what’s the right thing to do?
That’s a real struggle for me when I see a human error that benefits my seller. For a long time, it kept me up at night. What really helped me was remembering that we are a fiduciary to our client. We need to be respectable and honorable to people in our profession, but at the end of the day, we’re here to protect our client. If it’s something that’s for the good of our client, the right thing is to move forward with the contract and not draw attention to the error.
“This happened to me when I was a brand-new agent.”
Now, another scenario could be that you’re the buyer agent who gets to closing and realizes that you forgot to check the box. If that happens, you need to take responsibility for the mistake and pay for the home warranty, inspection, etc.
This happened to me when I was a brand-new agent. The fax machine ate one of the pages of my contract and nobody noticed. That page had the seller paying closing costs of $5,000. When we got to closing and I realized my error, I realized that the right thing was to take my commission and pay the closing costs, because that was the only way they were going to get into the house.
When right and wrong are in a gray area, this is how I balance a high level of integrity. However, it’s always clear that you need to act in the best interest of your client in every situation.
If you have any questions for me about this topic or about anything else related to real estate, don’t hesitate to give me a call or send me an email. I look forward to hearing from you soon.
