The listing broker just might owe you a commission. You procured a ready, able & willing buyer. That equals an earned commish.

I am a Realtor in a resort community in Texas, popular for vacation home sales.

In February of 2006, I was referred to a client by a friend of mine. He was interested in purchasing a vacation home, as he wanted to move his boat to the area. After setting up a search for him, he and his wife made a trip to the area to look a potential residences. Because of personal family problems, they decided not to puchase at that time. They made several more appointments throughout the year, but always cancelled at the last minute.

In April of 2007, they made the trip again and had picked out several listings to take a look at. I knew based on what they had liked before, they would not care for any of them, so I previewed a few that, while in their gateway, were not selected as something they wanted to see. We looked at all of the homes, and as I suspected they decided to make an offer on one of the homes that was not on their initial list. The asking price was 230K, and the home had been on the market for 8 days. We made an offer for 224K. The sellers agent came back with a counter of 227K. When I spoke to my client, he wanted to think about it. I told him I was sure the property would go quickly, as it was priced very well. He called back 24 hours later, and said he would pay 227K. When I called the seller's agent, he informed me he had received another offer that morning, and to bring our best offer. My client decided to come back at 228K. I was called later by the sellers agent, and told that the other offer had been accepted.

I always keep an eye on properties that I have lost as they go through the pending process, and I was shocked to see that the sellers agent had raised the asking price to 240K, while it was still pending. In the mean time my client had continued to mark favorites on his gateway, and inquire about other properties. Then, abruptly he asked to be discontinued from the search, with no explanation. I figured it was family problems again.

Last week I learned that my former client was the ultimate buyer of the property. He paid 240K for it and used the sellers agent and a girl from his office that had her license for 1 month as the intermediary. I have no idea who contacted whom, and have gone through a wide range of emotions in regards to these turn of events.

Foolishly, I did not have a buyers argeement with these people, as they were friends of a friend, and I trusted them. I can honestly say, I will never do this again, and I hope that this posting will prevent another agent from having this happen to them. I am waiting until after the holidays to decide if I am going to confront the sellers agent. Any advice would be appreciated.