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Article: Real estate agents: get your money's worth. (legalities of hiring a real estate agent)(includes related article)
- Article from:
- Consumers' Research Magazine
- Article date:
- February 1, 1994
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1994 Consumers' Research, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Will the real estate agent you hire work for you? This is a question that has the real estate industry in a state of crisis these days and, of course, bears directly on what you can expect this year when you enter the housing market.
At issue is to whom the agent owes loyalty in a real estate transaction. Centuries of common law--the legal rules that courts hand down, case by case--have set down an unambiguous rule: agents owe undivided allegiance to their client whether the client is a buyer or seller. The recent growth of buyer brokers--companies that represent only the buyer in a given transaction (never buyer and seller)--signifies growing consumer ...