Suing my real estate agent. (Oakland, Pittsburg: lawyer, new house, buyer)

[rparz]

I read that as the OP was confused into thinking that the fact that a permit was pulled means the sunroom is considered a part of the living square footage.

It's not. You could have god himself with the town mayor build a sunroom on a building, and it STILL won't be considered part of the living square footage.
By definition a sun room is NEVER considered part of square footage be it OP's property, your property, or mine, or anyone else's.
You still get to sit out there, the city won't be able to make you tear it down, (provided you pulled the correct permits initially) and you can sell it with the house later.

[DocGoldstein]

Originally Posted by rparz

I read that as the OP was confused into thinking that the fact that a permit was pulled means the sunroom is considered a part of the living square footage.

It's not. You could have god himself with the town mayor build a sunroom on a building, and it STILL won't be considered part of the living square footage.
By definition a sun room is NEVER considered part of square footage be it OP's property, your property, or mine, or anyone else's.
You still get to sit out there, the city won't be able to make you tear it down, (provided you pulled the correct permits initially) and you can sell it with the house later.

I think you're missing the point. It's not about a sun room, or the legality of adding it to the sqft of the home. It's about a buyer paying for something, and being mislead about what he's paying for (which I've been hammering the past few post).

Like I said, if the agent LIED to him about it being legally part of the sqft of the house, then sent out the e-mail later to cover her ass afterwards, he may have a case legally. I mean, why would she send out that e-mail AFTER escrow has closed? It doesn't make sense unless she's attempting to cover her ass.

You can't mislead clients about what they are buying, and then try to cover for it later. That's illegal. If he has proof of it (through e-mails, voice mails, etc), he has a pretty strong case to be compensated for what he's out of pocket for.

[rparz]

Originally Posted by DocGoldstein

This to me implies that the agent told the buyer that the sun room was part of the LEGAL square footage of the house (back to my point about people wanting exactly what they paid for). So he is rightfully pissed, just like any buyer would be if they are lied to about the square footage. We don't have all the details, the OP hasn't posted since yesterday. But if the agent did indeed say "the house is 1,800 sqft and the sun room is part of that", then after everything is signed and done, she then says "Actually your house is really only 1,460 sqft legally because the sun room doesn't count!" That tells me that agent was being disingenuous and lied to her client, or didn't do her legal duty as an agent to clear up any ambiguities about what the buyer was actually buying. I think he may have a case in that regard.

All this proves is that the listing agent is an idiot.
I think all you might get is the commission fee from the agent. After a lengthy fight, trying top prove the agent did it on purpose, with malice, and intention to deceive.

If the sun room was deemed illegal and ordered to be torn down, then yes I'd sue myself.

But this is a simple paperwork misunderstanding.

[DocGoldstein]

Originally Posted by rparz

All this proves is that the listing agent is an idiot.
I think all you might get is the commission fee from the agent. After a lengthy fight, trying top prove the agent did it on purpose, with malice, and intention to deceive.

If the sun room was deemed illegal and ordered to be torn down, then yes I'd sue myself.

But this is a simple paperwork misunderstanding.

Could be the case.

I think her e-mail after the close of escrow is pretty damning evidence of her trying to cover her ass. That e-mail should have been sent BEFORE escrow closed and any contingencies had been signed off. IMO, and from personal experience, I have seen agents pull worse things off than lying to a client about the sqft of a home they are buying. So I tend to side with the buyer in these type of conflicts.

[rparz]

Originally Posted by DocGoldstein

I think you're missing the point. It's not about a sun room, or the legality of adding it to the sqft of the home. It's about a buyer paying for something, and being mislead about what he's paying for (which I've been hammering the past few post).

Like I said, if the agent LIED to him about it being legally part of the sqft of the house, then sent out the e-mail later to cover her ass afterwards, he may have a case legally. I mean, why would she send out that e-mail AFTER escrow has closed? It doesn't make sense unless she's attempting to cover her ass.

You can't mislead clients about what they are buying, and then try to cover for it later. That's illegal. If he has proof of it (through e-mails, voice mails, etc), he has a pretty strong case to be compensated for what he's out of pocket for.

Maybe the agent sent out that email after she received and reviewed all the closing documentation (the seller, morgage company, and title company love to hold that until closing day) and emailed in good faith as soon as she discovered and realized there was an error?

I don't think there's some big conspiracy here, and unless you can prove that, you're not going to get hundreds of thousands of dollars in damages.

[Ultrarunner]

Winning a lawsuit requires proving the allocation plus establishing damages.

Then, if successful, and not later overturned, the plaintiff must try to collect.

It can be more complicated if you agreed to mediation or arbitration...

Was the agent new to the business? Do you want to rescind the contract?

The reason I ask is because it is very unusual for Agents I know to state anything other than to serve as a conduit of information.

In other words, listings may quote square footage based on Country Records, Owner Statement, Appraisal Information, etc with the caveat that it may or may not be accurate.

It is also very unusual for an agent to state permit status other than having copies of permits or not on file.

At least, this is the way the agents I deal with conduct business... they are very careful.

So, suing might not even be an option and damages must be established...

I've spent a lot of time researching permits looking at microfilm... sometimes the city/county records are not accurate or having conflicting information.

I sold a house a few years ago that had a small addition done maybe 50 years ago... the buyers went to the county and could not find a permit... it caused a lot of problems for me.

I contacted the family I bought it from and the daughter told me the contractor that built the addition is still in business... so I made a visit and they had a permit number in a dusty old file cabinet...

I then went to the city and they were able to locate the permit from the number...

The explanation given was there were a few problems when the archives were digitalized and this permit was one that was water damaged and did not scan well.

[rparz]

Originally Posted by Ultrarunner

Winning a lawsuit requires proving the allocation plus establishing damages.

Then, if successful, and not later overturned, the plaintiff must try to collect.

It can be more complicated if you agreed to mediation or arbitration...

Was the agent new to the business? Do you want to rescind the contract?

Good call, I think if the buyer wanted, the most recourse they could get is to back out of the contract.
If it bothers them enough to want to nullify the contract, fine, pursue a lawsuit.


If they still want to keep the house (at the current terms) and are just looking for a payday, GTFO.

[DocGoldstein]

Originally Posted by rparz

Maybe the agent sent out that email after she received and reviewed all the closing documentation (the seller, morgage company, and title company love to hold that until closing day) and emailed in good faith as soon as she discovered and realized there was an error?

That's a pretty damn big goof though, isn't it?

"Hey, that house you spent hundreds of thousands of dollars of cash on to buy? Yeah, actually I was wrong about the legal sqft of the home."

I don't think "Oh darn my bad" is good enough to get away scot-free from that.

[Rakin]

Assuming there was an appraisal which are very conservative today, he did get what they paid for.

I'm not saying in the OP's specific example that his sun room is illegal (we don't know that for sure), my example was a generic example to express the point that people want to get what they pay for.

I recently sold a home that was worth about $380k. The owner dumped it to an Indian buyer at $325k and his lenders conservative Appraisal came in at $360k. The Appraiser measured the home and came up with a discrepancy (lower) in footage.

After closing the Buyer wanted to sue everyone because the house measured smaller than was on the tax records. Forget the fact he bought the house $35k below his own appraised price.

[DocGoldstein]

Originally Posted by Rakin

Assuming there was an appraisal which are very conservative today, he did get what they paid for.



I recently sold a home that was worth about $380k. The owner dumped it to an Indian buyer at $325k and his lenders conservative Appraisal came in at $360k. The Appraiser measured the home and came up with a discrepancy (lower) in footage.

After closing the Buyer wanted to sue everyone because the house measured smaller than was on the tax records. Forget the fact he bought the house $35k below his own appraised price.

It depends on how much lower it was in sqft to figure out how much of an "outrage" it may have been.

If the difference between what the appraiser came up with, and what was stated originally was 3-4 percent, I think that's acceptable. From all the homes I've bought, I've accepted that as a good "human error" cushion. So on an 1,800sqft home, we're talking about 70 feet, a little less than a small bedroom.

But anything more, and you're stepping away from "human error and variation" to "scamming and misleading" very quickly. There's no way that the difference in stated size should equal a whole bedroom, even considering the differences in measurement technique and accuracy.