On Saturday, August 30, 2014 1:07:50 AM UTC-4, Pico Rico wrote:
"trader_4" wrote in message

...

On Friday, August 29, 2014 9:02:16 AM UTC-4, Pico Rico wrote:







I agree that if you agreed to the deal, received the givt certificates,

then didn't use one of their referal brokers, then the company has a

legitimate claim against you. But it's not for some astronomical

amount. What their damages would be is whatever referal fee they would

have gotten from one of the realtors for the referral. No reason to

believe that's much.



I bet they are writing their contract so they get the commission, and then

they will share it. So, arguably, their damages are 6% of the sales price.

Ridiculous. My local Century 21 is going to agree to that? They say
I get to pick the local company and they list major names like Centrury 21,
Coldwell banker. Typical sale, my realty firm gets 3%. And that is for
all the work they do in completing the sale. Some referal company has
no case for 6%, 3%. At most they have a case for a tiny piece of that,
ie whatever their referal fee that they get from realtors actually is.
They aren't selling my house, Century 21 is.




I am not sure that would hold up, given that they need to share the

commission, but that must be the approach they are taking.

Well, duh! Not sure that it wouldn't hold up? Of course it wouldn't
hold up. Their damages are what their referal fee would have been,
not the commission someone else would have earned and kept.




Maybe they are

adding a percent or two on the top, or maybe they will take a percent from

the real brokers. That could be a few thou per house.


In the question and answers on the website, it specifically says they are
not adding anything on top of the normal real estate commission.







The biggest flaws I see in all this a



1 - No mention of what exactly the gift certificates are. That no

clear examples are even given is a red flag. They could turn out to

be something with little value to you. Also those certificates are not

handed out upfront, apparently you get some each year for four or five

years.



yep. Who needs a white elephant?



Actually, I take that back. I see on the website where they do show
examples of great gift certificates, eg VISA, Macys, Target, Walmart,
Amazon, etc. If that is what you really get, those are fine by me.







2 - You don't know what realty firms they would have participating say

5 years from, when you do want to sell your house. If I knew that a

couple of the respected local firms would be the choice, then I would

consider the deal. That you don't know what the situation will be years

down the road is a big problem.



yep. or what commissions might be with or without this "arrangement".


They address that in the Q/A, standard commission










nop, the "scamming company" would come after you.





I agree it's actually the company that would have the case, for their

referal fee. I doubt they are going to come after you in court, when

they don't even have a presence in your state. And if they did, they

don't have some $10K lawsuit, it's probably not worth pursuing.



if they get big and turn into a paper mill, they could persue smaller cases

efficiently. And maybe they will gum up the works on the sale of a house so

it will be settled through escrow "willingly" by the seller.

Yeah, with a vivid imagination you can come up with all kinds of
nightmare scenarios.