Brownlee Gerry: Real Estate Agents Bill — Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
Brownlee Gerry: Real Estate Agents Bill — Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:649;Page:18388] 
GERRY BROWNLEE (National—Ilam) 
: 
 I wonder whether the Minister in the chair might be good enough to turn his attention to clause 6(3) of the bill which states: “For the purposes of this section it is immaterial whether or not a person carries out any agency work as a business in its own right or as part of or in connection with any other business.” The reason I am raising this is that when we see legislation rushed through Parliament we are left with the impression that there must be a few things in here that have not been properly considered. I take the Committee back to the definition of “real estate agency work or agency work” which is contained in the interpretation clause. It states: “(a) means any work done or services provided in trade on behalf of another person for the purposes of bringing about a transaction;”. Well that immediately raises the question about the status of private sales and about the status of deceased estates being sold within a family or for that matter outside a family—private sales between parties who are perhaps consenting over the values and property swaps. It raises the question about mortgagee sales and the way in which for example banks might cluster and group those sales. 
And then it raises other questions. Let us look for example at the recent purchase of a number of properties by the Christchurch City Council from a property developer in that city. Given that those properties were on the market but the parties did an off-market deal there is no doubt that the staff of the council effectively put themselves into a position under this legislation of being the agents who facilitated that particular transaction. It is interesting to note that the catch-all provision of “any other business” would tend to rule out the suggestion that it has to be a related business—a business related to the activities of a real estate agent. There is no suggestion of that at all. 
I think that that potentially causes quite a bit of a problem because we know that off-market sales occur frequently. We know that quite often if someone is the executor of an estate he or she may go out to relatives or family friends or others who are not direct beneficiaries of any particular estate indicate that there is a property for sale and then start to negotiate a deal. Well it would seem that under this particular law that will now not be possible. It will force people to accept the expense involved in taking on a licensed operator in order to give effect to that transaction. 
I am sure that is not the intention of the committee or even of the Minister. It will I think substantially slow the transfer of properties which might rightly be done outside the usual practice of working through licensed real estate agents. It is of course a fact that lawyers’ offices the Public Trust various banking institutions and others will not have a great interest in lining up with their papers all put together to become licensed real estate agents. 
That may not be the worst of it. I think by the reading of this bill the worst of it is that private sales between individuals are most certainly caught. It would be interesting for the Minister to offer the Committee his view on that particular point. 
It is interesting to note too that agency work “includes any work done by a branch manager or salesperson under the direction of or on behalf of an agent to enable the agent to do the work or provide the services described”. There are hundreds of people in this country who work as assistants to real estate agents. They are not real estate agents in their own right and they do not advertise their services. They may well under the instruction of the agent open up a property so that someone can view it. But they do not turn up with the papers that get signed in order for the transaction to take place. They are simply an assistant yet it would seem they are now caught under this bill and will need to meet all the requirements that this bill puts on real estate agents.