Real Estate Sales Rep Guilty on 19 Charges
Issue Date: - Friday, 7 December 2007
A licensed real estate sales representative escaped a criminal conviction by the barest of margins and was fined $1,500 with $874 in costs when she pleaded guilty to 19 offences relating to bond and residential tenancy offences in the Armadale Magistrates Court. A spent conviction was ordered.
The woman from South Perth was acting in her private capacity as a landlord when she breached the Residential Tenancies Act nineteen times in her dealings with a tenant living at a property she was letting in Armadale.
She told the court that her tenant wanted an informal agreement, a situation the Magistrate described as ‘naive' before describing her offences as ‘objectively serious’.
"Real Estate Sales Representatives undergo specialist training which involves them having an awareness of the laws that relate to property management, so I found this case particularly disturbing that a trained person would disregard the law and the rights of a tenant so blatantly," Consumer Protection Commissioner Patrick Walker said.
The woman’s offences related to:
- entering into a tenancy and not providing a copy of the lease agreement;
- failing to lodge security bond money in an approved manner;
- failing to provide receipts for money received;
- failing to keep mandatory records; and
- not providing the tenant with mandatory information.
"The occasions where money went unrecorded and without receipts being issued made the tenant vulnerable should any questions have arisen about non-payment.
"These actions although carried out on this occasion as an individual, could cause consumers to lose confidence in reputable real estate sales representatives and property managers," Mr. Walker said.
This page was modified on 15 September 2011 for legal reasons.