No Splitting the Baby
The way the Board of Realtors discourages procuring cause cases — essentially, disputes over who’s entitled to the payout commission (offered to the agent responsible for the sale) — is by applying an all-or-nothing standard.
That is, instead of divvying up the commission amongst competing agents, the Board makes a determination that only one agent should receive all of it (the list-side commission usually isn’t in dispute).
Talk about “raising the stakes” for pressing a claim (or resisting a settlement, as the case may be).
Unintended Consequences
The only catch with such an approach?
A “winner take all” outcome can make the dispute even more heated, the rival agents’ positions more entrenched, etc. — and a resulting compromise that much tougher.
In the majority of procuring cause cases I’m familiar with, the reality is that both agents* claiming the commission played a role in the sale.
Perhaps just not an equal one.
*It’s also conceivable for there to be three(!) agents vying for the payout commission.
That can be the case when the listing agent meets the Buyer at an open house; the Buyer subsequently brings in their own agent to negotiate the deal (“new agent”); and the Buyer initially started working with another agent, way back when, who may also have expended effort working with the Buyer (“old agent”).
Got all that??
