My problem started with signing up with Buy Owner. I paid $2,799 for them to advertise my house on their website. After a month went by and I didn't get one call from anyone interested in seeing the house, I decided to use MLS Realty. They are the only company authorized to work with BuyOwner clients. Their brochure, which is included in your BuyOwner package, states that you can receive a full refund of your BuyOwner fee when you sell your house using their company.
An agent named Danielle Coats came to my house and said that she would work really hard to sell my house including additional advertising in the paper, online and have an Open House. She seemed helpful at first but then I started having problems with her not showing up when promised, not returning phone calls, etc. Once she printed flyers for my front yard sign that were so dark that you couldn't read the print or see the pictures. Then agents for potential buyers started commenting that she wasn't returning their calls. Then the worst thing she did was put the wrong 'asking' price for the house, which made some people mad when we had raise the price up another $20,000 after they made an offer.By the way she never did have an open house or advertise elsewhere.
Not long after that I got a call from the managing broker, Kelly Grugan. She was very apologetic and said that Danielle had been fired and in fact her license had expired. She said that she would handle my home sale for me. At first, she seemed like she was going to get things turned around in the right direction but very quickly she showed the same professionalism. She wouldn't return phone calls to me or to the agent for the buyer when I finally got an offer. (Shouldn't the managing broker know when their agents license expire?)
The only offer I got on my house was for less than what I owed. So out of desperation, I began a request to have a Short Sale on my home. I had to do all the leg work myself. I had no real estate agent to assist me. Kelly Grugan never even saw or visited my house much less made an effort to help me sell it. After someone stole the sale signs from the road, I asked her to send me another one and she said "No, that will cost $25 to Fedex them to you". I asked her to print more color flyers for the sign in my yard and she said "no, that will cost me $50 to print those and then send them to you". When the house was under contract I asked her to take the lockbox off my door because sometime my son was home alone and she said, "That is going to cost me $50 to have someone come out to take that off".
When it came time to finish up the Short Sale, she was suppose to gather information for the closing. On the day of the closing she (Kelly Grugan) didn't show up. This caused last minute paperwork to be gathered by people at the attorney's office which added another 2 hours to the meeting. It was awful! We all (me, the buyer's realtor, the closing attorney and the buyer) sat at the closing table talking about how horrible she had been through this whole deal. They said they had experienced the same problems with her not returning their calls and then making up excuses. I called her after the closing and she said no one told her when the closing was. UH, then how did I know about it? She was the one that told ME when it was. What a liar? I told her that it took about two hours to gather the info that she had promised to provide. She said, "Oh well, it all worked out though". She didn't even apologize, much less care.
Today I got my refund check from them for the Buy Owner fee. It is $2,354. Not $2,799. I called Kelly Grugan to ask why it's not the full amount. She said, "I need to find your paperwork and call you back". That was 3 hours ago. No call back. What a surprise.
0 comments