I have a house that I bought to fix up & resell. I showed the house about 1 1/2 months ago to a couple. Several weeks later I talked to them and they got their ducks in a row and wanted to make an offer. We met at the house which is located right around the corner from their friends house where these buyers were staying for some time. They drove by my house and have seen it for sale for a while. I wrote up the purchase agreement, etc obviously as a seller's agent which I disclosed to them. We have the appraisal done and everything is almost ready to close and their buyer's agent (which I was unaware of) calls me and wants to know if she can get a referral fee because of all of the work she had done with them previously. I told her I accepted the buyers offer based that I am getting all of the commission. I am struggling to decide whether she should get it because the exclusive buyer agency contract she sent me (which has not yet expired) says that she is paid based on her success in locating, negotiating the sale of the property. She did not do any of this. I told her that the issue of compensation is an issue between her and her buyers. I welcome your insights and any points anyone makes regarding this. I can see the situation from both sides.

Did you ask the buyer if they were working with another agent? That should be the #1 question on every agents list and documented when going over the mandatory agency disclosure definitions upon the first meaningful contact.
With that form in your pocket, saying they are not working with another agent, you are not obligated to pay the other agent.
Since she had no knowledge of "her" buyers working with you, one could make the assumption that she abandoned her buyers.
Ask the buyers about their reasoning and get some input.

Pikes Peak,
Thanks for your insight. Very helpful. I think I should be all set!

Since there is the existence of representation, it comes down to what the buyer says. Realtor arbitration typically favors what the client says. However, if you failed to ask question #1 you may have made a costly mistake by interfering with an existing agency unless the client has violated or cancelled their representation.

As the other poster said, ask the buyers for input.



What referral fee? Did the buyer's agent refer you the client? It does not appear so.

Do buyers actually say they have an exclusive buyer agency agreement with another agent? If they looked at your house over the course of 2 months I would bet they did not even know they had signed such an agreement.

Many agents make their buyers sign these things before they will show the buyers some houses and the buyers have no idea what they are getting themselves into. I have heard agents say they make everyone sign just to tie them up and get a piece of something.

If this agent thought she had a chance at getting the commission she would not be asking for just a piece of it.

Excuse me now, I have to go put on my anti-flame suit.

I can't tell you how many times that my wife would come home from showing one of our listings and say " They really like it, they're going to call me back and let me know if they plan on writing an offer" blah, blah, blah. Within 24 hours an agent calls to say that they are sending an offer over on our property. Then we realize that this particular agent is representing the buyers that the little woman met at the property earlier.

The nerve that some agents have. Let another agent rush out and leave the house while she is ready to sit down to dinner with her family, to do your job and show your clients a property. Than send us over the offer without ever seeing the property and act like your doing us a favor. At least have the courtesy to say "Thank you for showing my clients the property" instead of acting like you don't know that we did, or that we probably won't ever figure it out even though we'll see the buyers name on the contract.

After a few times of playing this game, she now ask every buyer ahead of time... "Are you currently working with an agent". I guess if you get burned a few times you eventually learn.

This conversation reminds me of the time I showed a house to a woman who said "fax the contract to me and I will sign it." I faxed the contract for the signatures...a while later it came back rewritten, with another agent's name on it as the selling agent. When the heck did this other agent get into the picture? Near as I can tell, the purchaser had met with a particular mortgage broker, whose wife was the other agent. I think it was this mortgage broker's procedure to say something like, "If you're not working with a particular broker, why not work with my wife?" and thus get his wife some business. Needless to say, we didn't refer any business to this particular mortgage broker. I was SO MAD! Both at the mortgage broker and his wife, but also with my broker, who refused to stand up for me in this whole procedure.

My revenge, if you can call it that, is that the deal fell apart when the seller moved out of the house and allowed the utilities to be shut off, the water pipes froze and burst, and the buyer cancelled the purchase.

I would ask the buyers if they mind adding a little $ money to the deal so the other agent that they didnt tell you about could get a referral fee.

Sounds like you had procuring cause of the sale of your listing/house to those buyers. You shouldn't owe that agent a dime. Now depending on how that buyer agency agreement reads those buyers might owe that agent some money. But you didn't sign that buyer agreement. Or agree to anything. Also the above is right. Why would she be just asking for a referrel. I think she is just fishing. Hoping you'll just hand it over.

if it was me I would go to my broker, show her the paper work and go from there. that is what our brokers are for, to lead and guide us. My broker is a godsent for me

I have to say this is a sad situation, and unfortunatly it is the actions of a few bad agents which give the rest of us a bad name. To be honest, i dont like having customers sign a contract, that may be good or bad but i leave that to after i have shown some homes to show good will and some good faith. to date i havent been burned (touch wood, although the potential is there).

It sounds to me like the typical agent who wants to get paid for doing nothing. I would talk to your broker and if they are the type to not do anything i would also contact your loacal board to get their input.

Best regards

Nick