Consumer Affairs Victoria has conducted a range of compliance and educational activities to help ensure homebuyers do not experience the illegal practice of underquoting.
The Regulator said its inspectors recently made unannounced visits to 29 metropolitan and regional estate agents’ offices to monitor their compliance with underquoting laws.
“We will take further action if any wrongdoing is identified based on those inspections and the information gathered,” Consumer Affairs said.
“We monitor the property market year-round and identify cases or agents to visit or investigate further based on factors such as advertising, sales data and complaints from vendors, purchasers or the public,” it said.
“We have taken a number of court actions as well as issuing fines for underquoting where we have identified underquoting breaches in the past and will continue to do so where required.”
Consumer Affairs said underquoting could occur when a property was advertised at a price below the estimated selling price, the seller’s asking price, or a price that had been rejected as too low by the seller.
The Regulator said estate agents must prepare a Statement of Information (SOI) for each property they were selling, which should include an indicative selling price and the three most comparable property sales, where possible.
“SOIs must be available in all internet advertising, open for inspections and, when requested, given to a buyer within two business days,” it said.
“The indicative selling price must be updated if a written offer within the range comes in and is rejected as too low.”
Consumer Affairs said agents who underquoted risked penalties of more than $33,000; losing their sales commissions; as well as penalties under the Australian Consumer Law of up to $10,000,000 for corporations and $500,000 for individuals.
Further information on underquoting can be accessed at this PS News link.
