COLDWELL BANKER

We found the property listing through our own searches on the internet. We called the Listing Agent/Broker, Tom Bartlett, to set an appointment to view the property. We were handed over to his Assistant, Tammy, who showed us the property. She told us on the phone that this was a Short Sale. Those words were not in the listing information on Realtor.com, and the information is still not on the MLS listing. Tammy was somewhat helpful but we were never able to get in contact with the Broker himself. We believed the asking price for the property was much higher than the market would support based on all of the similar properties for sale in the area. Since the property has been for sale over a year without an offer we believed the price needed to be re-evaluated by a professional. Having just spent 2 months trying to purchase a different property, and being in a "Trasactional Broker" situation in that purchase, we decided to obtain the services of a Buyer's Agent to represent us in this purchase offer. Tom and his Assistant suddenly left voice mails when we cancelled our meeting with them, pressuring us to use their office solely - as a Transactional Broker. We exercised our right to use a Buyer's Agent instead. We spent 5 hours going over comps for the property with our Buyer's Agent and another hour making an offer to purchase the property. Our BA submitted our offer to the Listing Agent with the comps to support our offer. Five days later, Bartlett called our Agent and gave a verbal counter offer, and revealed his opinion that our offer was too low to submit to the mortgage holder because it was just too much paperwork. Our Agent explained we pulled comps and the offer was solid, we were bonafide buyers and the lender should be presented the offer so a BPO would be done to value the property in today's market, which is the defined process for Short Sales. Bartlett refused to present the offer to the lender. Our Agent emailed Bartlett to request written documentation of the counter-offer, he ignored the email, refuses to present the written signed counter offer, and will not return her phone calls. He is being most unprofessional and breaking many Articles of the Realtors Code of Ethics. We are in the process of filing a complaint with the State Board of Realtors.