{"id":77514,"date":"2025-08-18T13:40:11","date_gmt":"2025-08-18T13:40:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/77514\/"},"modified":"2025-08-18T13:40:11","modified_gmt":"2025-08-18T13:40:11","slug":"i-just-wanted-to-buy-a-home-but-the-real-estate-agent-blew-up-the-deal-with-a-wild-cash-demand-before-i-could-even-make-a-bid-heres-the-real-reason-why-they-did-it-though","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/77514\/","title":{"rendered":"I just wanted to buy a home – but the real estate agent blew up the deal with a wild cash demand before I could even make a bid. Here’s the real reason WHY they did it though\u2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Melbourne<\/a> real estate agent has sparked outrage amid claims it demanded $2,000 from a home buyer before they would be allowed to bid at an auction.<\/p>\n

The potential buyer claimed on Reddit<\/a> that a real estate agent for Local Expertz Realty, in Melton, west of Melbourne, demanded the ‘deposit’.<\/p>\n

He insisted he had attended auctions previously without having to pay any such fee.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘They always make you fill out the same bidder registration form with all your personal details, along with a copy of your driver’s licence, which all makes sense to me,’ the post read.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘Today however, after filling out the bidder registration form, I get a call from the agent saying I need to deposit $2000 into their company’s account.’<\/p>\n

The buyer claimed he was told by the agent it was ‘standard practice’.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘They tried to reassure me by saying that the money will be refunded if I don’t win the auction, but I wasn’t having it,’ the buyer posted.<\/p>\n

‘There is absolutely no need for such a ridiculous stipulation. He told me it was a company rule and there was nothing he could do about it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"A <\/p>\n

A Melton real estate agent has come under fire amid claims it asked a home buyer for $2000 to participate in an auction\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘I simply refused and said I’d just look elsewhere before hanging up.’<\/p>\n

But\u00a0Local Expertz Realty director Jesse Singh hit back at the claims, telling Daily Mail the buyer planned to call in his bids over the phone.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘We do not ask a potential bidder to pay any deposit to attend an auction,’ Mr Singh told the Daily Mail.<\/p>\n

‘However, if a potential bidder wishes to bid over the telephone and we\u2019ve never met or transacted with the individual previously, we may ask the bidder to deposit $2000-$5000 in our trust account to validate that we\u2019re dealing with a genuine bidder to protect the owner’s interest and avoid facing a false bidding situation.<\/p>\n

‘The deposit sits in our trust account which is a non-interest bearing account and the money is fully refunded the next business day if the potential bidder does not win the bidding or chooses not to bid at all.<\/p>\n

‘This is permitted by Consumer Affairs to filter out a false bidding situation.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘It becomes tricky for the public when someone is telling part of a story.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘That buyer obviously didn\u2019t mention on Reddit that he wanted to bid over the phone and he was interstate.’<\/p>\n

\"Local <\/p>\n

Local Expertz was named as the company that asked a buyer for a $2000 deposit just to bid on a house it was selling\u00a0<\/p>\n

The original poster mentioned that detail in a later post near the end of the Reddit thread, although it was almost hidden among the hundreds of comments on his post.<\/p>\n

‘I only preregister because I don’t live in the area and can’t attend the auction in person,’ he noted.\u00a0<\/p>\n

A spokesperson for Real Estate Institute of Victoria told Daily Mail the practice was legal, adding: ‘Some agents may use this as a way to confirm the validity of a bidder.<\/p>\n

‘The legislation does not prohibit this. The key is that it is fully refundable and held in the agent\u2019s trust account,’ the spokesperson said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Reddit users slammed the little-known practice and questioned if this was now considered ‘normal’.<\/p>\n

Many noted the actual seller was likely unaware potential buyers were being put off even bidding due to the ‘refundable deposit’.<\/p>\n

‘Lots of people out there looking to find a home would be attending more than one auction,’ one said.<\/p>\n

‘When we were looking, we planned out a weekend with six auctions (fortunately, we found and “bought” a place before we needed to go through that…)<\/p>\n

\"Reddit <\/p>\n

Reddit users mostly agreed they were not okay with being asked to pay large deposits to real estate agents just to bid at an auction<\/p>\n

‘Having to front up with a deposit for EVERY auction they plan to attend is really cutting down on the amount of potential buyers.’<\/p>\n

Some readers suggested other real estate agents across Australia have demanded similar deposits.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘I had one tell me today I had to pay a $2,000 deposit to put in an offer,’ they posted.<\/p>\n

‘It\u2019s my first time going as far as wanting to put in an offer so have no idea if this is normal or not, but I thought they had to present the owner with all offers, so I don\u2019t see why I\u2019d need to pay a $2,000 deposit.<\/p>\n

‘You got off easy, I was asked last year for a $5,000 deposit to make an offer. That was for a real estate agent in Eltham, VIC,’ another person claimed.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘I would think it’s to make sure they’re only dealing with legit buyers; if you don’t have $5,000 then how can you possibly afford the property.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘Didn’t have that experience when looking at any other properties.’<\/p>\n

Other Victorians have shared similar stories on Reddit over the past year.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"The <\/p>\n

The Local Expertz team has come under fire amid claims someone demanded a despot from a home buyer to participate in an auction\u00a0<\/p>\n

One posted seven months ago that the home buyer needed to transfer a $2,000 holding deposit into the agent’s trust account and send a screenshot when it had been made.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘We have registered for a few auctions and never had to do this before,’ the poster claimed.<\/p>\n

‘The text also said that if we are successful, the $2,000 will go towards our deposit, or if we\u2019re unsuccessful it will be transferred back to us within 24 hours.’<\/p>\n

‘In Victoria there is no requirement to register for an auction, unlike in other Australian states,’ one reader responded.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘You are better off not replying to this and just showing up at the auction and bidding if you feel like it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘Don\u2019t lodge the money, don\u2019t ask them about it, it will create some uncertainty at their end which is a good thing for the buyer.’<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Melbourne real estate agent has sparked outrage amid claims it demanded $2,000 from a home buyer before…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":77515,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[64,63,48,100,647,44,2579,105],"class_list":["post-77514","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-technology","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-crime","tag-dailymail","tag-melbourne","tag-news","tag-reddit","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77514","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77514"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77514\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/77515"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77514"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77514"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77514"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}