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Ohio real estate and contract law, can my bid to purchase real estate be ignored

Asked over 3 years ago - Akron, OH

I placed a bid for a property that was for sale. The listing agents office did confirm they recieved my bid, but the listing agent has refused to respond to myself or my agent. Two days after recieving my bid, they sold the property at sheriff's auction for less than my current bid. Can they ignore a bid which has already been placed?

Additional information
If we do not list our house with an agent, can we restrict the new owner to "how" the property is to be used,i.e, cannot be made into apartments, but must be a "single family" type agreement?

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Attorney answers (1)

Douglas M. Mercurio

Reputation Level 7

Answered over 3 years ago. Real Estate Attorney in North Reading, MA.

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While I am not licensed in OH, this seems highly unusual. In MA, where I am licensed, a real estate broker has an obligation to bring all offers to their client and failing to do so could result in sanctions, including losing their license. Without knowing if the offer was ever presented to the seller it is difficult to determine whether the listing agent was incompetent or if they were working with somebody who planned to bid on the property at the impending auction. That being said, they could have presented the offer to the Seller who did not respond, or did not accept the offer, in which case the only wrongdoing here was poor communication. It sounds suspicious, but even if you were to determine that something fishy was going I do not believe that you would have a remedy which would benefit you. I would defer to what an OH attorney has to say on the matter, but this seems extremely unusual.

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