Latest / Best of Business / Maree Tassell: iFindProperty founder on the growing calls to regulate property flippers

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Maree Tassell: iFindProperty founder on the growing calls to regulate property flippers · Best of Business

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  Speaker 1: You're listening to a podcast from News Talks'd be follow
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  Speaker 1: Ever do for ce Ellen.
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  Speaker 2: Now there are calls for a regulatory crackdown on property flippers.
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  Speaker 2: These are people who lock in a house under contract
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  Speaker 2: or a property under contract, but have a long lead
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  Speaker 2: into settlement, and in that intervening period they then line
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  Speaker 2: up another buyer and they settle on the same day
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  Speaker 2: contemporaneously and then pocket the difference. The number of these
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  Speaker 2: deals almost doubled last year. The levels are now even
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  Speaker 2: higher than the COVID boom. In fact, it's got so
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  Speaker 2: bad that a complaint has been lodged with the real
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  Speaker 2: estate authority. Marie Tassel is the owner of I Find
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  Speaker 2: Property and a real estate agent, and with Ushi Mari
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  Speaker 2: Hi Nedda.
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  Speaker 3: What is the complaint, Well, the complaint is that I
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  Speaker 3: believe consumers have the right to know that if someone
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  Speaker 3: puts an offer on their property, whether they intend to
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  Speaker 3: buy it. You know, if John Smith has a contract
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  Speaker 3: on a property, I think that I would want to
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  Speaker 3: know that John Smith is buying it, not that On
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  Speaker 3: Smith is pretending to buy it and bringing a whole
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  Speaker 3: lot of other people through and trying to onsell it
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  Speaker 3: without telling anybody for a whole lot more money.
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  Speaker 2: Oh, because there is an element of deception to this
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  Speaker 2: in some cases. Isn't that where they say that they're
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  Speaker 2: getting builders through to come and inspect it, but in
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  Speaker 2: fact they're buying, They're bringing through potential buyers.
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  Speaker 3: That's correct. So what is often happening, and this has
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  Speaker 3: been happening. I mean, I've been around in the property
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  Speaker 3: industry for a long time, and twenty years ago there
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  Speaker 3: was a lot of this and then it basically dried
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  Speaker 3: up overnight when the real estate agent's authority came in
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  Speaker 3: and said it was illegal. But the last few years
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  Speaker 3: we've seen a proliferation of it again, And so there
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  Speaker 3: is a lot of deception. A lot of the time
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  Speaker 3: people will come in and they will just have usually
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  Speaker 3: a simple due diligence contract, which just means I want
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  Speaker 3: to do my homework, but they very frequently have no
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  Speaker 3: intention of buying that property. And then there are people
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  Speaker 3: that I've got these databases that they send that I'm
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  Speaker 3: going to call it a deal. They've seen the yell
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  Speaker 3: out and say here's the property. They provide a whole
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  Speaker 3: lot of information about the property like a real estate
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  Speaker 3: agent would, and then they aim to on sell the
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  Speaker 3: property for a much larger fee. Very often, the vendor
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  Speaker 3: has no idea this is happening until after settlement, when
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  Speaker 3: they suddenly, well, there's two ways they'll find out it's
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  Speaker 3: happened after settlement, when suddenly they realized they sold the
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  Speaker 3: property to John Smith for a million, and then John
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  Speaker 3: Smith on sold at one point two million and nobody
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  Speaker 3: told him. Or when they've had their property tied up
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  Speaker 3: for twenty days and suddenly it falls over and they
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  Speaker 3: discover that person had no intention of purchasing the property,
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  Speaker 3: they were just trying to sell it for more.
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  Speaker 2: Is it illegal?
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  Speaker 3: I believe it is.
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  Speaker 2: What I feel about it.
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  Speaker 3: What's illegal or legal about the illegal? What's illegal is
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  Speaker 3: that the Real Estate Agency at two thousand and eight
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  Speaker 3: defines quite clearly that anyone that's involved in trade and
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  Speaker 3: making money from providing information or selling properties to help
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  Speaker 3: people sell or buy property are acting as a real
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  Speaker 3: estate agent, so they should be licensed. They should. That
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  Speaker 3: means that they should be governed by a regulatory body,
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  Speaker 3: and that any consumer that's interacting with them, whether that's
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  Speaker 3: a vendor or a purchaser also is protected and they
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  Speaker 3: can make a complaint if that person behaves in a
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  Speaker 3: way that that's marine.
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  Speaker 2: Is it a matter of interpretation because you could also
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  Speaker 2: interpret them as the new vendor, couldn't you.
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  Speaker 3: It is a matter of interpretation. I think yes and no.
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  Speaker 3: But it was made very clear to me when the
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  Speaker 3: real estate agent's authority first came into being back in
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  Speaker 3: two thousand, when the Act came in in two thousand
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  Speaker 3: and nine. Because I used to do this, although I
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  Speaker 3: did not do it for an undisclosed fee. I was
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  Speaker 3: what you would call a property trader, and I was
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  Speaker 3: getting properties non selling them, although I would always disclose
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  Speaker 3: the difference. And at that time I then had real
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  Speaker 3: estate agent investigators breathing down my neck constantly and telling
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  Speaker 3: me that I was breaking the law. I even flew
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  Speaker 3: down to the area to meet with the then legal
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  Speaker 3: counsel to thrash it out with him, and I was
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  Speaker 3: told in no uncertain terms that I was breaking the law,
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  Speaker 3: that they wanted to see licensed by his agents operating
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  Speaker 3: in New Zealand, which is what I now do, and
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  Speaker 3: that if I didn't do that, they'd see me in court.
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  Speaker 3: So and at that time they were quite proactive about
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  Speaker 3: investigating people, and there was a case at the time
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  Speaker 3: of a woman who was prosecuted. And then what happened
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  Speaker 3: here that is, basically overnight all of the people doing
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  Speaker 3: this dried up because they got too scared to do it.
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  Speaker 3: But now they're all back out there, and there's a
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  Speaker 3: lot of people out there that are selling courses. They
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  Speaker 3: call themselves gurus or mentors or whatever you want to
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  Speaker 3: call it. Property in real estates always seem to have
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  Speaker 3: attracted you know, sharks or snake oil salesmen who well,
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  Speaker 3: a lot of times people who are quite gullible, don't
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  Speaker 3: know a lot about property. They'll pay a whole lot
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  Speaker 3: of money for a course to learn how to make
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  Speaker 3: what they call no money down deals, which sounds very fun,
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  Speaker 3: sounds very easy, but there's I think it's very unethical
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  Speaker 3: most of what's happening. And my reason for the complaint
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  Speaker 3: to the area was because I've spoken to quite a
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  Speaker 3: few purchases who've dealt with some of these people and
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  Speaker 3: had bad experiences. And I've also spoken to quite a
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  Speaker 3: few vendors agents who've contacted me upset when they've found
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  Speaker 3: out after the fat that's somebody that they thought was
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  Speaker 3: acting as a purchaser wasn't the true purchaser. Then they're
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  Speaker 3: embarrassed and they because then the vendor finds out and
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  Speaker 3: these agents didn't know. So because I'm a buyer's agent,
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  Speaker 3: they will come and talk to me about this. So
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  Speaker 3: I've spoken to a lot of vendors' agents out there
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  Speaker 3: who aren't happy about the lack of disclosure as well.
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  Speaker 2: Thank you Marie for running us through. It's absolutely fascinating.
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  Speaker 2: Marie Tassel, find Property co founder and real estate agent,
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  Speaker 2: will keep an eye on how that complaint goes with
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  Speaker 2: the area.
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