How Do You Deal With Dishonest Buyers/Tenants?

Photo Credit: www.mainstreamrealty.com

 

Recently I had a referral from a friend of mine for tenant looking to lease a property to open an addiction rehab facility.  As you may know, this is a rather challenging project to work on as many home owners don't like the idea of having their homes converted into a rehab facility.  Therefore, the client offered to pay an additional incentive if I can find a property and a landlord who will accept her application.

The tenant who was referred to me spent more than three weeks trying to find a residential property for lease (through other agents and by herself) AND get an application approved for opening an addiction rehab center.  Well, to cut the long story short, I found it for her in two days.  After many long hours and tons of phone calls, I finally found a property which she liked and the landlord was willing to approve the use of as a rehab facility.

Then, my client told me that she didn't think the back yard was large enough for the rehab.  So we continued our search only to be turned down by many more landlords.  She, then decided that she wanted to go with the property that I got her approved for under one condition that her business partner comes and takes a look at it and approves it.  So, I schedule a second viewing.  We all met, her partner said he loved property and wants to proceed with signing a lease.

To cut the long story short, after couple of days of lagging both myself and the listing agent, my client admitted that she has been looking for other properties and that she isn't going to sign the lease for this property.  

I understand that she is entitled to search and find the property which fits her best interest, but what I don't understand is why she felt the need to lie and play games.  If she wasn't happy with the property, she could have just said so instead of having both myself and the listing agent waste our times with drafting and negotiating a lease agreement.

How do YOU handle similar situations? Do you have them sign an agreement to pay you for your time in advance? Do you charge a flat fee regardless of the outcome? Do you collect half of the incentive they are offering before you begin spending time and then half at the end?  I would LOVE to hear your opinions and your suggestions because I don't want to find myself in a similar situation again.