The BC Financial Services Authority has found a Surrey real estate agent liable for misconduct, for manipulating a client into selling her home.
According to the BCFSA, Ismail Jamal Jinnah committed professional misconduct and conduct unbecoming a licensee, in connection with a pair of "separate but related" transactions in June 2015 in which he "pressured and manipulated" his client to switch properties with another individual.
In a summary of the decision shared by the authority on Sept. 4, BCFSA says Jinnah "took advantage of his client, who was vulnerable because she was in a close relationship with him and trusted him."
He also failed to: disclose the nature of the representation he was providing to the client; promptly and fully disclose any conflict of interest; act in the best interest of a client and act honestly and with reasonable care and skill; and disclose all known material information to a client, the summary continues.
“The licensee exploited his personal relationship with a client, while being in a position of trust and influence, in a manner that can only be described as predatory,” said Jonathan Vandall, vice-president of compliance and enforcement at BCFSA.
“Pressuring or manipulating a client in order to sell a property or earn higher commission is conduct that falls alarmingly short of the professional standards that BCFSA expects licensees to uphold."
According to the BCFSA decision, the misconduct occurred while Jinnah was working with RE/MAX Blueprint Realty, located at 15288 54A Ave. The complaint was received by the Real Estate Council of B.C. in September 2018.
Jinnah, the decision states, pressured a client into selling her detached home – despite her telling him she did not want to sell – and buying the purchaser's townhome.
He also told her he'd be charging above-market commission on the sale of her home "because of the value of his work."
The transactions were the first two of Jinnah's real-estate career, the decision notes. He represented himself in the proceeding.
The client who was pressured testified that she is an insurance agent, and had been involved in four real-estate transactions prior to those at issue in the hearing. She purchased her detached home in 2001.
After separating from her husband in 2013, the client met Jinnah through a dating site and developed what she considered to be a boyfriend/girlfriend relationship – including dinners, drives and walks in White Rock – that lasted until July 2018.
She testified that Jinnah started talking to her in May 2015 about selling her home; a topic that "dominated their conversations" following a camping trip. She said that Jinnah, in pushing her to sell, cited reasons including that she had too much debt; that she didn't need a big house; and that her detached-home property would suit the buyer he had in mind, as they had an autistic son and the property was near a school.
At one point, Jinnah was yelling at her over the phone that the buyer needed the house more than she did, she said.
Jinnah denied that he and the client were in a romantic relationship at any point between 2015 and 2018 and testified that they did not discuss the sale/purchase transactions prior to creation of the contracts of purchase and sale.
He claimed he was not involved in the client's decision to sell – a claim BCFSA hearing officer Thelma O'Grady named among examples of "false and misleading evidence" provided by Jinnah – and agreed that he made more than $39,000 in commissions from the two sales.
O'Grady found "much" of Jinnah's evidence "conflicting."
"His testimony was unsupported by the documents and independent witnesses," she concludes in the decision.
"I find that Mr. Jinnah gave false and misleading evidence throughout the investigation and at the hearing."
O'Grady found it "abundantly clear" that the relationship "should have raised a number of red flags to Mr. Jinnah as to how he approached and rendered professional services" to his client. As well, that Jinnah "exploited (his client's) trust" in order to earn above-market commissions.
"I find that on the balance of probabilities, BCFSA has established that Mr. Jinnah's actions amounted to conduct unbecoming as alleged," O'Grady writes. "Mr. Jinnah's conduct was contrary to the best interests of the public, undermined public confidence in the real estate industry, and brought the real estate industry into disrepute."
Sanctions have not yet been determined. However, Jinnah surrendered his licence to provide real-estate trading services in early March 2024. The liability hearing was held over eight days in April.
