SELLING COMMERCIAL PROPERTY

When selling real estate, you may want to list your property for sale with a real estate firm. If so, you will sign a listing agreement authorizing the firm and its agents to represent you in your dealings with buyers as your seller’s agent. You may also be asked to allow agents from other firms to help find a buyer for your property.

Be sure to read and understand the listing agreement before you sign it.

Duties to Seller

The listing firm and its agents must:

Promote your best interests

Be loyal to you

Follow your lawful instructions

Provide all material facts that could influence your decisions

Use reasonable skill, care, and diligence

Account for all monies handled on your behalf

On signing the listing agreement, the firm and its agents may not disclose any confidential information about you to prospective buyers or their agents without your permission. Until you sign the listing agreement, avoid telling the listing agent anything you would not want a buyer to know.

Services and Compensation:

To help you sell your property, the listing firm and its agents will offer you several services. These may include:

Helping you price your property

Advertising and marketing your property

Providing all required property disclosure forms for you to complete

Negotiating for you the best possible price and terms

Reviewing all written offers with you

Promote your best interests

For representing you and helping you sell your property, you will pay the listing firm a sales commission or fee. The listing agreement must state the fee amount, or the method for determining the commission. You should also make it clear whether you will allow the firm to share its commission with agents representing the buyer.

Dual Agent

The listing firm and its agents may represent both you and a buyer at the same time. This ‘dual agency relationship’ is most likely if an agent with your listing firm is working as a buyer’s agent. If your listing agreement has not already made allowance for a dual agency relationship, then your listing agent will ask you to sign a separate agreement. It can be difficult for a dual agent to advance the interests of both the buyer and seller. Nevertheless, buyers and sellers must be fairly and equally treated by their dual agent, and can prohibit dual agents from divulging certain confidential information about them to the other party.

Some firms offer a form of dual agency called ‘designated agency’. In this case, one agent in the firm works with the seller and another agent with the buyer, to enable fairer representation of both the buyer and seller.

A dual agent’s loyalty is divided between parties with competing interests, so it is especially important to understand: