I'm taking matters into my own hands.....in a BIG way

I attended a risk management class the other day (given by an attorney) and they talked about how dual agency in CA could go away, if agents cannot behave!

Unfortunately, ethical agents have to be the ones to report obvious transgressions.  Please keep us informed as to what you are doing.

I would advise those agents and brokers who think that they can continue compromising the industry that we are in to officially watch their backs.

Stay tuned.......

I am staying tuned!  I have had many of the same feeling you have had.  Keep us posted.

Ralph, a good friend recently finally filed an ethics claim against a local agent who had crossed the line one too many times. Will be interested to see what comes of your efforts. Wish you the best! Sharon

This is probably a stupid question but why couldn't you report them to the Board? I'm sure you could find one or two Code of Ethics violations. After 3 violations, I think they can be kicked out or suspended, at least that's the rules at my Board.

After navigating through 31 years of various real estate cycles, I have also seen times when ethical behavior of some agents seems to wane.  But, I have also noted there seems to be an "evolutionary" process to it all.  As those agents don't seem to last long, because word gets out, and other agents simply won't work with them. 

I applaud your intentions, but I think your fighting a no win battle. NAR, CAR, DRE and your own boards want the dues of as many agents as they can get. And (some of you more politically correct people may not like what I'm going to say next, so you better sit down), in my market we have a ton of "newer" agents from areas around the world where ethics are a joke and an afterthought. So, if they grew up in that environment, you can't expect people to change what they believe in their core being to not be a problem. You can't change someones DNA and core beliefs and ways of doing business for hundreds of years. Anyone can take and pass a test, but not everyone can change their belief system when presented with such large sums of money that we deal with. And again for you politically correct people, I'm not at all saying it's everybody from other places. I'm saying that in my market, it's becoming a larger and larger problem.

We're still seeing a lot of money under the table going to the sellers of a short sale. Or, the buyer has to buy a personal item (chair) for $20,000. Or, I know an agent who husband under his name bought two short sale homes for all cash that his wife the agent was selling. Or agents double ending homes at lower prices and not even showing all the offers to the seller. I have 100 other stories of fraud or bad ethics.

I used to be on our boards ethics committee, but there was never much to work on because it was too hard for agents to file a complaint. That has to change also, but I'm sorry to say that it wont really matter.

And where are our officials in all of this. In my market they're all traveling to different cities to meet with each other and have dinner and drinks etc. and go to Sacramento to beat up on the banks again and again.

anyway, good luck.

Ralph, it's painful to see...."compromising of ethics that I'm seeing by a fair percentage of agents."

An agent started showing home for the first time at open house today and within less than an hour says - I have 5 offers. (Yes, there was a traffic at the open house, does that mean someone came to visit the home with the offer? And not one, 5 of them? Isn't it to tempt buyers to write an offer that's lot higher than asking?) Ethical? May be, if it was true - and I don't believe if that's possible!

Ralph - best wishes. I can feel from your post you are about to swim hard upstream. Fortunately I get a bad co-broker experience once a blue moon and I usually just tell them my pro opinion of how things are being handled incorrectly, cite the source and move on, without a lot of extra effort... You feel like it's become epidemic, then you handle it in your BIG way and I hope the best for you!

Ralph, well you have me wanting to hear more.  I don't think you can have it both ways.  You have to either make the time to protect yourself and enforce ethical transgressions, or not complain about them.  I guess you're now making the time, so good for you and good luck.  Why are you consulting with the AFL-CIO? 

If you have the passion. .go for it. .

otherwise, I would fight it from a control point. .your own company and fight battles as they come. 

taking on a war. .you better have passion and lots of money. .to replace income loss while you deal w/ the stress and time that  will take to move such a great boulder. .

Ralph, I couldn't agree more.  Right now, it seems, it is like a roadway full of drunk, unlicensed drivers that are crowding our roads.  THe first thing ever Broker should do is hand out the Code and force the agents to read it.  I've recently witnessed some unsavory business practices.

Oh, my, Ralph.  I really can't wait to read the rest of the story.  We could share a couple of absolute horror stories right now.    

A CEO once told me "those that cause waves usually drown" Look at the moral decay of the nation and you can see why a recent survey of 25 to 35 year olds said 87% were ok with people that lied, 77% were OK with someone that cheated on there income tax and 53% were ok with what was considered by most unethicial as  long as it got the deal done in their favor.