Time article riles Realtors

By Buck Wargo

Fri, Sep 4, 2009 (3 a.m.)

A Las Vegas real estate agent featured prominently in Time magazine has come under fire from members of her profession and has generated unease in the real estate community about the public’s perception of agents.

Realtors have asked a state licensing board to investigate Brooke Boemio’s conduct for possible transgressions, real estate industry sources told In Business Las Vegas. They also have asked an FBI fraud task force to investigate.

The Aug. 14 article that featured Boemio, an agent formerly with Coldwell Banker Wardley who specialized in short selling, talked about encouraging clients to buy a new home for about half the price of their existing home on which they would then stop making payments. Rather than let the house fall into foreclosure, the article detailed how she works with banks to let it be sold for less than the mortgage amount while it is potentially rented out.

Boemio talked about how she bought a home for $279,000 and walked away from the payments on her previous home.

Records from the Clark County assessor’s office show Boemio owns a home bought in November on Sunrise Meadows Drive that has a taxable value of $282,409 in 2009-10. The home was valued at $440,477 previously.

The article details how Boemio and Time reporter Joel Stein broke into a for-sale home in western Las Vegas. Stein entered through a window and opened the door for Boemio, the article said.

Boemio, who is no longer employed at Coldwell Banker Wardley, didn’t return phone calls seeking comment.

Jeff Sommers, the firm’s president, told reporter Brendan Buhler of the Las Vegas Sun, a sister publication of In Business Las Vegas, that his company has conducted an internal investigation and has been unable to find any cases of Boemio engaging in the behavior described in the story. Sommers says the buy-and-bail tactics described in the story are serious and “really in direct opposition to everything in our policies.”

Other industry representatives say they don’t know what’s true because people sometimes say something in an article in a national publication that are exaggerated to attract attention.

Linda Rheinberger, president-elect of the Nevada Association of Realtors, says that several real estate professionals forwarded a copy of the Time article to the Nevada real estate division asking the group to investigate Boemio.

The group oversees the licensing of real estate agents and brokers.

“Other Realtors contacted me about that,” Rheinberger says. “We are very concerned with the article and want them to investigate, but who knows if there will be any violations. There could be some issues there, but we are not the judge and jury.”

Business and Industry Department spokeswoman Elizabeth Daniels says the agency can’t confirm or deny whether an investigation is under way, but says officials “were aware of the situation and taking appropriate action, whatever that may be.”

The division has the authority to suspend or revoke a license, Daniels said. No information is provided to the public unless a case is presented to the Real Estate Commission for a hearing, she said.

The article prompted Greater Las Vegas Association of Realtors President Sue Naumann to issue a statement Aug. 25 about it. The association pointed out that Boemio was only a provisional member of the group and had not become a Realtor.

“We are troubled by comments attributed to a local real estate agent in a story published last week by Time magazine,” Naumann says in the statement. “The person quoted in this story had not completed her required orientation class and had not taken the pledge to abide by the association’s code of ethics. Therefore, she is not a Realtor. If proven to be true, the acts and real estate transactions alleged in this story violate our association’s strict code of ethics and are not tolerated.”

Officials say Boemio hadn’t completed a required ethics course.

“It’s ironic the ethics portion was not completed,” one official said.

The statement did not detail which actions would have violated the group’s ethics codes, but others weighed in.

“She is encouraging people to do something that is clearly unethical — this whole buy-and-bail concept. It is dishonest,” one industry representative said.

Realtors said banks have cracked down on the practice of buyers getting another home before walking away from their existing one.

The state will decide if any violations occurred.

Speaking in general terms about the industry and not any specific case, Daniels said the division has provisions on ethical violations dealing with honesty, trustworthiness and integrity.

Rheinberger says the issue could fall under the scope of giving someone legal advice, which is outside the scope of an agent’s license.

“We never want our members giving this type of advice,” Rheinberger says. “We don’t want to tell people to turn their backs on their promises.”

Realtors said even if there are no violations, it doesn’t look good for the profession. Some suggested the most obvious red flag would be entering the home without permission.

“Breaking into a house doesn’t set well with professionals,” one Realtor said. “There has been a tremendous backlash with this article. I think (Realtors) are insulted because, generally speaking, we abide by a code of conduct and ethics. It gives a black eye to the real estate industry in general and Las Vegas Realtors especially.”

Rheinberger says it’s possible that inexperience led to Boemio’s conduct, which is why mentoring and training are important. She says she’s concerned similar issues could arise because of the state of the recent housing market.

“It is a concern of ours because we want to see things done correctly,” Rheinberger says. “We don’t want anything to jeopardize our reputation. It has been a difficult time for many of us. We work hard for what we do and provide a valuable service, and anything that is a negative is very disturbing.”

Brian Wargo covers real estate and law for In Business Las Vegas and its sister publication, the Las Vegas Sun. He can be reached at 259-4011 or at wargo@lasvegassun.com.