For any real estate agent who’s run an open home, last month’s news that a realtor in Sydney accidentally burned down a multi-million-dollar house just before she was due to hold inspections would have struck a nerve.
The incident made global headline, with The Sun newspaper in the UK dubbing Julie Bundock an “agent of chaos” after her mishap.
Bundock was busy tidying up the four-bedroom home in the city’s prestigious northern beaches when the fire broke out.
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According to Australian media, Bundock had taken some bed sheets that were drying on the deck and put them on a shelf near a light, which she then turned on. The heat from the light is believed to have caused the blaze.
Her agency was ordered by a court to pay more than A$850,000 in damages.
OneRoof talked to several agents in both New Zealand and Australia about the incident and found that running an open home is often a nerve-wracking experience.
Brisbane-based Ray White agent Avi Khan told OneRoof he felt for Bundock. “Mistakes happen, but this is quite a big mistake,” he said.
The fire-wrecked house in Sydney that cost a a real estate agency more than A$850,000. Photo / Fire and Rescue NSW, Facebook
It’s an agent’s job to make a house more hospitable. “They’re trying to present the property in the best light, to get the best value for the seller, which is what we’re taught to do as agents,” he said.
“However, common sense has to prevail in these instances as well and you leave the house as you found it. It’s a reminder to all the agents out there to check with your sellers before you start moving things around and to be vigilant.”
Khan said that while burning a house down wasn’t a common nightmare, there were quite a few others that tended to keep agents up at night. “Agents often have nightmares about people breaking into a home they are selling or attendees at open homes stealing things.
“Our worst nightmares are sometimes the situations that we inherit with the sale. We have nightmares about buyers and sellers yelling at us. Sometimes the banks are involved. Sometimes it’s divorce. Sometimes it’s a death. Sometimes it’s [a] family violence issue. People don’t understand that we’re not trained counsellors.”
Bayleys agent David Rainbow once walked in on a vendor in the bath during a house inspection. Photo / Fiona Goodall
While no New Zealand agent has ever accidentally torched a vendor’s home, some have been involved in some awkward moments.
LJ Hooker Manurewa agent Dylan Turner said the Sydney fire had been much talked about in his office. “It was a bit of a freak accident. But when we are at open homes we try not to touch too much. It is somebody’s else’s house. I personally wouldn’t throw sheets into a hallway cupboard.”
Turner did say one of his colleague’s open homes almost ended in chaos when a set of house keys went missing. “The agent had an inkling that a person who had been through had taken the keys, but she had another open home to get to so she locked up and phoned her husband and asked him to drive over to the house.
“By the time he got to the home there was a truck backed up to the house. No kidding. And they were trying to get into the house using the keys,” Turner told OneRoof.
“When they saw the husband parked in the driveway, they rammed his car out of the way and drove off. The police caught up with them eventually.”
Veteran Bayleys Remuera agent David Rainbow told OneRoof he once left the keys to a house on his passenger seat while putting open home signs out. When he came back they were gone. He paid to change the locks.
His most embarrassing open home was when he took a potential buyer into the bathroom and found the vendor in the bath. Rainbow said she was wearing headphones and had not heard him enter the house.
Most New Zealand real estate sales are completed without incident, but a glance at Real Estate Authority tribunal decisions shows some deals end disastrously.
One of most unusual cases in recent history, from 2014, involved a real estate agent who was found guilty of causing more than $19,000 of willful damage to a property he had sold via mortgagee sale.
“He damaged a large number of the walls by smashing a tool through the gib board, which had been finished and painted,” the tribunal summary noted. “He used a tool to damage all the kitchen cupboards and drawers. Using a claw hammer he damaged the shower cubicle and attempted to rip off the shower wall.”
The Real Estate Authority recommends that vendors note and store securely items of sentimental or monetary value, such as jewellery or computers. It also recommends that vendors never write down alarm codes or leave keys under the front door mat.
Vendors should also check with their insurance provider and their real estate agency to see if they are covered for theft or accidents during an open home.
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