Crackdown on phantom offers

By Matthias Duensing ( August 27, 2015, 8:00 PM EDT) -- The mysterious sounding “phantom offer” is a possible verbal bid brought by a sellers’ agent. Such an offer is not registered and often not presented, as other offers are, and rarely is it recorded. Alleged phantom offers are used by selling agents to alarm potential buyers into raising the amount of their offers to spark extra rounds of bidding. Bill 55, the Stronger Protection for Ontario Consumers Act, 2013, made changes to section 35.1 of the Real Estate and Business Brokers Act, 2002 and section 19.1 of Ontario Regulation 579/05 made under REBBA 2002, aiming to eliminate so-called phantom bids. The new rules, which came into effect July 1, will be enforced by the Real Estate Council of Ontario....