We should never be too busy to help our clients!

Not long ago I was representing a buyer of a property when I received a call from the seller.  She apologized profusely for calling me, but she had gotten a text from her agent that she didn't understand and she hadn't been able to reach her agent for two days to get an explanation.  She was afraid the deal would fall through if she didn't follow the instructions that she couldn't figure out.

Her agent's text said, "Selling agent MUST receive TDS by tomorrow - please review and forward ASAP."

I explained that the TDS is the Transfer Disclosure Statement, which all sellers must complete and provide to the buyer and that her agent must have given her that form to fill out and sign among the papers he probably gave her. 

And she didn't understand that the buyer's agent is called Selling Agent, which to her seemed like it should mean her agent, since she was the seller.  I acknowledged that the terminology was confusing, but her agent was called the Listing Agent.

She called me back a few minutes later and said she had gone through a large stack of document her agent had dropped off, but she didn't have any form called Transfer Disclosure Statement, so I told her I would try to reach her agent. 

I left several voice mail messages, then an email and finally a text over about a 24 hour period, but it wasn't until the second day that I got a return call.  He was upset with me for several reasons:

     »  I had no business talking to his client without his permission.

     »  As long as I took it upon myself to "give advice" to his client, I could have simply emailed a TDS to her.

     »  He is a very busy agent and he doesn't have time to deal with every phone call when he's busy, so he doesn't appreciate receiving all those messages.  I should be more patient and he'll get to me when he has time.

I guess my biggest mistake was in failing to realize just how important this guy was!

I took a deep breath and started to calmly explain what his client had told me and what I had told her to calm her down.  I didn't feel I had given her any "advice" by simply defining a couple of terms to her.  His response was that he didn't want to hear "excuses", and he also planned to give his client a piece of his mind.

Say what?  First he hangs his own client out to dry (what part of fiduciary duty does he not understand?), and when I try to help him by settling his client down and trying to reach him so he can maintain his relationship with an upset woman, I'm the bad guy - or one of them - and his client is also evil for panicking after he scared her like that, spoke in terms she didn't understand, and then left her feeling abandoned?

Sorry for the rant, but this was wrong on so many levels.  The deal did finally close, but last I heard from this agent he said he was still deciding whether to report me for talking to his client behind his back.

Real estate can be a stressful business, but we don't need to make it more so.  And it is important for us all to realize that it is far more stressful for our clients than for us.  Our job should be to manage our own stress while we do all we can to minimize the stress on our clients.

And by the way, I hadn't made any demand that I receive the TDS by a certain time limit.  We still had plenty of time to exchange disclosures.  When I asked him about that, he said that he must have confused our transaction with another one (he's so busy, you know).

Am I missing something here?  What would you have done?



******************
 Susan Neal

Broker / Realtor
Century 21 Noel David Realty
Fair Oaks, California

Full time real estate services in Fair Oaks CA, with friendly professionalism, 30+ years experience. 

I work hard to give my buyer or seller a low-stress transaction.

"Happy clients make me happy."

For all your real estate needs or questions, call me at (916)705-8951or visit my website at www.SusanNealFineProperties.com.

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