If you have been involved in a trade in real estate in which you believe a real estate licensee may have acted improperly, or you have engaged a brokerage to provide you with rental property management or strata management services, and believe that licensee has not acted properly, you may contact the Real Estate Council with respect to filing a complaint. Note: The Real Estate Council is not empowered to resolve commission disputes, make monetary settlements or adjudicate contract matters.  Please refer to the Making a Complaint About a Licensee page on this site or contact the Council and request a Complaint's Package at 604-683-9664, toll-free 1-877-683-9664 or email at info@recbc.ca

The Real Estate Services Act states that a real estate brokerage holds deposits with respect to a trade in real estate as a stakeholder. The money is held for the transaction and not on behalf of one of the parties. If a party does not remove a subject clause, or the trade is for some other reason not going to complete, the brokerage requires the signature of both the buyer and seller in order to release the deposit. If either party will not agree to the release of the deposit, then the parties may have to apply to court for a determination of the deposit issue. You may also want to refer to the "Information about the contract" section of the Contract of Purchase and Sale under #2 – Deposits.

The listing contract is a legally binding contract and you have to get the agreement of the other party in order to cancel the obligations that contract has created. If you cannot get that agreement, you may wish to seek legal advice.

Sellers and their licensees have an obligation to disclose known latent defects to buyers. A latent defect is one that is not obvious on a reasonable inspection of the property and which would have a substantial impact on the buyer’s use or enjoyment of the property. If a buyer believes that information about a known latent defect has been withheld by the seller or the seller’s licensee, legal advice should be obtained.

Once accepted by the seller and buyer, a Contract of Purchase and Sale becomes a binding agreement that creates certain responsibilities that each have agreed to accept and/or perform. A seller or buyer should always obtain legal advice prior to taking any action that may place them in breach of a contract.

The name of an individual or of a company may be searched Licensee Search page. That data base will tell you whether a particular individual or company is licensed to provide real estate services. Only information related to currently licensed individuals is available.

Disciplinary orders dating back to 2004 are posted here.  The Council does not provide information about whether complaints have been filed about individuals; only orders related to a finding of professional misconduct are posted.

As of January 1, 2006, strata management became an activity for which a real estate licence is required and the conduct of licensed strata managers became subject to the requirements of the Real Estate Services Act, over which the Real Estate Council has jurisdiction. However, the Strata Property Act, the legislation that governs the rights and obligations of strata corporations, strata councils and strata owners, remains a self-administered statute and there are no enforcement provisions for the Government of BC or the Real Estate Council. Under the Strata Property Act, it is up to the owners themselves, with the possible assistance of the courts or an arbitrator and/or mediator, to resolve disputes and ensure compliance with the provisions of the Strata Property Act. 

Strata managers act under the direction of the strata council of the strata corporation, by which they are engaged. It is the strata corporation as a whole that is the client of the strata manager, not the individual owners. Therefore, if individual strata owners have concerns about a strata manager, they are advised to first take their concerns to their strata council for resolution and any action the strata council may see fit to take. This may include the strata council submitting a complaint to the Real Estate Council with respect to the conduct of the strata manager if the strata council believes the strata manager has committed professional misconduct or conduct unbecoming.

In most cases, the Real Estate Council requires complaints regarding the performance of licensed strata managers to be submitted by strata councils, accompanied by a copy of the minutes of the council meeting that confirms the passing of a motion to submit such a complaint to the Real Estate Council.

Strata corporations may self-manage without being licensed. This self-management may be undertaken by strata lot owners within the strata corporation. Sections 2.1 and 2.18 of the Real Estate Services Regulation provide for exemptions from licensing for employees of the strata corporation, and for caretakers/managers employed by the strata corporation, respectively. The details of these exemption sections may be reviewed by viewing the Real Estate Services Regulation. 

Section 5-1 of the Council Rules requires a brokerage wishing to provide strata management services to a strata corporation to enter into a written service agreement with that client unless the client does not wish to do so. If such an agreement is entered into, section 5-1 outlines a number of typical issues which must be addressed in that agreement. It does not dictate how those issues are to be addressed. That is a matter of negotiation between the parties.  
Some strata management brokerages may prefer to enter into a ‘standard’ agreement which has been created by a law firm on behalf of strata management associations, knowing that this agreement addresses the issues required to be addressed by section 5-1 of the Council Rules. However, strata corporations are at liberty to negotiate how any or all of the matters set out in section 5-1 are to be established. Strata corporations may wish to obtain independent legal advice with respect to the service agreement they are been asked to enter into.  

No. As with other aspects of the services that a strata manager may provide, this is a matter of negotiation between the strata corporation and the brokerage. If a brokerage is to collect and hold funds on behalf of the strata corporation, those funds must be kept in a separate trust account in the name of the brokerage on behalf of the client e.g. ABC Strata Management Co. in trust for VR 12777. If the brokerage is to also collect and hold special levy and/or contingency reserve funds on behalf of the strata corporation, those funds must be held in at least one other separate trust account.