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A West Australian real estate agency has received a slap on the wrist for leading landlords to use a maintenance and repair company she also owned — and then overcharging them.
Anna-Marie Thornton, director of Harcourts Prestige Real Estate, was reprimanded and fined $4,000 by an administrative tribunal for failing to exercise due care, diligence and skill in her supervision of the agency. The business was fined a further $6,000 for breaching the real estate and business agents act and the code of conduct.
The state’s consumer protection body found that between May 2019 and April 2021, Ms Thornton’s agency recommended that five property owners who were clients use the services of Prestige Maintenance Perth for repairs and maintenance. Ms Thornton was the sole director of Prestige Two Pty Ltd, which traded as Prestige Maintenance Perth. The business has since ceased trading.
Prestige Maintenance Perth then used third-party contractors to perform the repair and maintenance services for the agency’s clients. Invoices served to the property owners were found to contain mark-ups of between 17 and 70 per cent on top of the contractors’ original price for the work completed. The invoices were then paid from trust monies held in the names of the owners.
The five properties involved were located in Perth’s southern suburbs of Treeby, Piara Waters, Gosnells, Harrisdale and Wattle Grove.
Western Australia’s commissioner for consumer protection, Trish Blake, said this outcome showed it is important agents are abiding by the code of conduct, which requires them to always act in good faith and in the best interests of their clients.
“Agents need to be mindful of their obligations under the code of conduct and make certain the interests of their clients come first at all times,” Ms Blake said.
“Clients need to receive value for money from any service provider engaged on their behalf. In this case the agents’ use of a company in which Ms Thornton was involved did not provide value for money as Prestige Maintenance did not do anything that the agent could not do itself.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Juliet Helmke
Based in Sydney, Juliet Helmke has a broad range of reporting and editorial experience across the areas of business, technology, entertainment and the arts. She was formerly Senior Editor at The New York Observer.
