A commercial real estate broker is a person who acts as a link between a buyers and a sellers real estate. This relationship is one of fiduciary responsibility, meaning that it is a relationship based on trust.
The person appointed as the broker, has the responsibility of ensuring that his salespeople handle the transactions according to law. The sales people are known as real estate agents and their responsibilities include representing the seller or the buyer in the transactions and making sure that they get the best possible treatment. The agent representing the seller ensures that the seller receives the highest possible price for the property they are selling, while the agent of the buyer will negotiate for the lowest possible price. The buyer's agent will also try to find properties in the best structural shape that fits within their estimated price range.
In many places, such as the United States, it is mandatory for the broker to have a license to negotiate the sale and purchase of property. The broker can act as either the proprietor of a company or as an agent for another company. There are various ways to get the certification as a broker. One way is by going to school and passing a state test. Another way is to hold a position that automatically allows you to apply for and receive the certification, such being an attorney.
Following 1992, there were brokers from Florida and Colorado that recommended that the professional relationship between the agent and the client should be broken. Instead, they felt that the dealings between the two should be strictly limited to the actual sale and purchase of real estate, without taking the personal interest of the client into consideration. In Florida, the Broward Board of Realtors went so far as suggesting that the brokers and agents merely help the selling and purchasing parties with finalizing the sale, without the bond of trust. The only requirement being that they adhere to both legal and moral standards.
The result was that in 2003, Florida amended the law and made all real estate licensees have only a transaction relationship unless there is only one person acting as the representative for both parties. This will not apply if there is a business link between the two parties.
The change in the law also made it mandatory that the aspects of the transactions be made in writing and removed the dual and sub agency designations. A dual agency results when a broker handles the transactions of both the purchasing and the selling parties. Both parties would have agreed to this arrangement in writing. The sub agency agreement meant that two agents from the same brokerage would represent the selling and purchasing parties. Like a dual agency transaction, it would have to be agreed upon in writing by both parties to the transaction.
Gregg Hall is an author living in Navarre Florida. Find more about this as well as commercial real estate loans at http://www.commercial-loans-now.com
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