This agent has 3 reviews.
Andrew took advantage of our inexperience as first time homebuyers for his personal gain and the sellers gain. He:
Failed to disclose conflicts of interest or dual agency. He was working for the seller and not for us, as became apparent as the sequence of events unfolded in the transaction.
o We found that Andrew was charged for this same violation in February 2023, failing to disclose dual agency. He was charged for negligence, incompetence, and breach of fiduciary duty.
o This is a public record that can be found by looking up Andrews license on the CA Department of Real Estate: https://www2.dre.ca.gov/PublicASP/pplinfo.asp
Failed to disclose important information about the home while touring it before we offered. The home had many serious issues not obvious to laymen and especially a first-time homebuyer like us, but would be known by a competent real estate agent. These issues included a brick foundation that needed to be replaced, bad plumbing, hazardous old electrical panels, exposed asbestos flooring, and more.
Misled us regarding the homes insurability for earthquake. Because this house is old, before placing an offer, I asked Andrew if he thinks it would qualify to get earthquake insurance. Andrew dodged the question and said you dont need earthquake insurance because its a sturdy wooden house that wont fall down.
o Regarding how to convert the basement to an ADU, Andrew told us that he would lift the house to get it to the ceiling height requirement for a legal living space, and we were so confused why he didnt suggest just digging it down by underpinning or benching since we later researched this and found it to be less costly than lifting and altering the foundation.
o Very early in the inspection, our home inspector raised major concern about the foundation. It is an unreinforced brick foundation in poor condition. He said that the house is likely to come off the foundation in a big earthquake, and that we need to spend $140k+ to replace it before its safe to move in. The inspector also pointed out that this house is in a dangerous earthquake zone on a major, clock-like fault overdue for a big earthquake. If it werent for our inspector, we could have been swayed into buying a house with high danger of causing extreme financial loss, injury, or death.
o This type of foundation is so dangerous that commercial buildings with the same type of foundation paste disclosures on the outside to warn people and protect their liability. Now that we are aware of this issue, we are able to spot it ourselves on these other buildings, meaning any reasonable real estate agent should also be able to identify and point this out.
o Our inspector also told us that brick cannot be dug down to raise the basement ceiling height for an ADU, indicating to us that Andrew knew about it all along and did not tell us. The brick was also visible from the basement and we had no idea about it, but a competent real estate agent would be expected to spot it and alert us. Both Rachel and Andrew were there with us when we toured the home before placing an offer, and neither told us.
o We used our own inspector rather than going with agent referral due to our concern with Andrews prior actions.
Dismissed our concern to request an inspection fee refund from the seller since they breached their contract of disclosure and clearly knew about the issues since they would not accept FHA but accepted our conventional offer for $25k less than our FHA offer, and even nailed shut the door going under the house showing the best view of the foundation and wet crawlspace. Andrew did not offer any help in this regard, again in the interest of the seller and not us.
o Due to his major betrayal of our trust and gross dishonest misconduct, we reported Andrew to his managing broker at Keller Williams Realty and they refunded us the inspection fees.
Consider this a warning to all other buyers to steer clear from Andrew. Unless you are a seller with no morals and a risk appetite to get caught up in buyer disputes, really everyone should steer clear.
2023