It should go without saying....a buyer's agent owes a fiduciary duty to his or her client at all times. That means that the agent should be acting in his or her client's best interests at all times. Among other things, the buyers confidential information should remain confidential....until or unless the Buyer authorizes the agent to disclose it.
A listng agent or a seller's agent owes the same duty to their seller.
That's why there are some things I generally do not ask a listing agent - among them is "why is the Seller selling the house?" I don't ask because the answers I get or expect to get range from "It's none of your business" to an outright lie as to why they are selling. Bottom line, unless the Seller has told their agent to disclose the reason for the sale, then the agent should not be disclosing it.
So, it baffles me as to why I have run into a string of listing agents asking me to disclose information about my buyers......BEFORE WE HAD EVEN SEEN THE HOUSE.
Last week and this week, I had a number of agents ask me some or all of the following:
Tell me about your buyers......
What is your buyer's price range......
What are your buyers looking for in a house.....
All of these (and more) were asked while I was merely trying to set up the showing! I brushed off the questions with some stock answers like:
I've worked with these buyers for a while and this house falls within what they are looking for and within their price range.
They're looking for a house in this town in this price range.
They're preapproved to buy a house in this price range.
The responses I recieved back ranged from offended to surprised. They could not believe that I was not going to hand over that information and even worse did not understand why I would not. Ultimately I assured them that I knew what my clients wanted but that I generally did not disclose that information about them.
Unfortunately, there may be some buyer agents who have not done their homework with their clients. And, there may be even more who will disclose their client's information at the drop of a hat.
Not this one. For exclusive 100% conflict-free buyer representation in the the Norfolk County area, contact your Canton MA Buyer Broker.
And listing agents......remember that you represent the seller and I represent the buyer. I don't expect you to break your fiduciary duty to your seller so please do not ask me to break mine.
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