Nobody knows! No one said anything. The name and contact information are not available.
You would think that this information would be set out in the Offer. It didn’t. It just gave the name “John Smith”.
However, the deal didn’t close and we can’t figure out which John Smith out of the one million John Smiths on the planet bought this property. Who do you serve with the legal papers?
If the Seller doesn’t close, that’s easy, the property is listed under the Land Registry system.
But, if the Buyer doesn’t close, we have absolutely no way of tracking them down.
This is an error on the part of the Buyer’s agent, and they can be sued.
This is also an error on the part of the Listing agent and they can be sued.
It’s no defence, just simply to shrug your shoulders and say: “well, there’s no place on the Form”.
Fintrac documents if they happened to be completed might help, but they are not mandated in law early enough.
Brian Madigan LL.B., Broker