British Columbia’s media has recently been focused on the flipping of high-priced real estate in Vancouver, with many Realtors becoming wealthy profiteers in the process. No indication how many Realtors are involved, but this type of flipping has been around for a long time, and is not limited to Vancouver, of course.
I had an 88-year-old neighbour whose wife died in June, 2012 after a long illness; his daughter lives in the U.K. and her husband died very shortly afterwards. My buddy had lived in Canada for about 45 years, and decided to return to his London birthplace to live out his life with his daughter.
Needless to say, he was consumed with grief and jumped at the offer of assistance from another neighbour whose relative was a Realtor. My buddy gave me regular updates of how things were going; something smelled fishy, so I asked if he was aware of house flipping. He seemed to trust those he was dealing with, and his house sold in a few weeks.
I never asked about any monetary values and drove him to the airport at the end of August, 2012 with only two suitcases, not a lot to show for his life in Canada. Next day the Realtor’s sign appeared on his lawn and when he telephoned from London to say he’d arrived safely he was shocked to hear the house was being flipped and the new asking price published on the realtor’s website shocked him even more.
With his permission, I wrote a letter to the editor mentioning no names, but giving details I was aware of; after being published unedited in The NEWS under the headline “A cautionary take,” I received calls from several readers who knew of similar transactions that had taken place in Parksville and Qualicum Beach.
I notified him and his daughter of the feedback and they filed an official complaint with the Real Estate Council of B.C. (RECBC). On receiving a copy of the complaint, I finally became aware of just how much advantage had been taken of this elderly gentleman and just how much his trust had been betrayed. Everything in the house had been included in the sale, including his car. Not only was his thinking impaired by grief and loneliness, but apparently he was quite unsophisticated in business dealings, which had always been left for his wife to handle.
Although it is unethical, flipping is technically legal, but there’s no doubt those who profit from any dishonest case of real estate flipping will be receiving the karma they deserve.
Bernie SmithParksville
