Dummy bidding out in the open

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From: The Gow's


Hi guy's got this info from E Choice web site

We've warned home-buyers several times of the real estate agent's tactic known as "dummy bidding". Now a Melbourne court case has confirmed how frequent dummy bidding is - with a well-known auctioneer admitting he pulled bids from "out of the air or from a tree" and a magistrate calling dummy bidding "deceitful, misleading and fraudulent".

From Melbourne's Age newspaper of July 4:

A magistrate yesterday condemned the widespread practice
of "fictitious bidding" by real estate auctioneers as evil,
deceitful and misleading.

The magistrate, Colin Macleod, said that "pulling bids out
of the air ... in my view, amounts to a fraud".

He made the comments in the Melbourne Magistrates Court
during a defamation case brought by prominent eastern
suburbs real estate agent Tim Fletcher.

Mr Fletcher had sued a buyer's advocate, Justin Dunne,
whom he alleged called him an idiot and threatened to report
him to the fraud squad after an auction in May last year.

Dismissing the defamation claim yesterday, Mr Macleod said:
"I find that Mr Fletcher, in using what on evidence, sadly, is a
common practice, was indulging in a deceitful, misleading
and fraudulent stratagem to boost bids."

During the trial, Mr Fletcher admitted in court that he pulled bids from "out of the air or from a tree" during auctions and said it was a legitimate tactic practised by many auctioneers.
 
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Reply: 1
From: Crystal .


Hi Everyone,
Several years ago I landed a job with a Real Estate Agency. On my first Saturday, I attended one of our auctions and was asked to stand next to another agent from our agency. We were to look like a *couple* This agent, *my partner* was bidding in the auction and made the highest bid. The house was passed in but *my partner* went inside to *negotiate* with the vendor.
I was horrified and quit.
Regards,
Crystal
 
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Reply: 1.1
From: Chris Legg


I had occasion last year to complain to this particular agent of his ethics after I purchased a property from them at auction.

The property had a reserve of $220k and they were advising purchasers me included that their estimate was in the high hundreds.

This of course resulted in a large number of
people attending the auction but their were only 2 of us once the bidding went over $200k
It was passed in on my bid of $210k and I was taken inside and told I could buy the property for the reserve of $220k.

I did in fact buy the property as the bank value was $230k.

I was prepared to pay a further $10k to buy the property so they short changed their vendor by at least $10k.See Neil Jenmans Book and website www.jenman.com.au

The silly part about all this was that the vendor was the daughter of one of Fletchers
salesmen so they even have dubious ethics with one of their own.
 
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