Live Near Metro

This guy has a great website and presents himself very well. To all appearances, he is the picture of professionalism. It ends there. He is respectful--calls everyone sir or ma'am. He shows up in his own limo from his own fleet--all very professional looking. The problem is that he usually comes unprepared. He rarely checks the listings that we send to him in advance of our meeting. One one Saturday, we arrived at his office with a list of 14 homes to see. He assured us that we would see them all, but he had to break it up with other meetings. To his credit, we saw 9 of them and decided that the remainder did not suit our needs. Yay Michael. The following week, we spent 4 hours visiting one site, because he was so ill prepared. He did not bring his business cards, so we could not see one of the properties. He did not communicate with the listing agent in advance, so we could not see another. We asked him to put in an offer on a particularly lovely home in our price range. Again, he did not do his due diligence to ensure that the property was suitable. In fact, the disclosures, which he never read, included the fact that the garages on which the homes are build were in such poor condition that the structural engineer's inspections indicated the need for complete rehabilitation.. Other documents showed that consultants advised that the condo association take out loans for $2 million to complete renovations on the garage and other major parts of the condo structures. Finally, the accounting review showed that the condo association would be underwater by $500,000 in just 2 years with only the ordinary level of expenditure. Fortunately, we read those documents and withdrew. I wanted to fire him then, but my girlfriend worried that we had a contract with him and that we should not do so. The final straw came when we found an apparently perfect home. I texted him after seeing it suggesting that we make an offer for $525,000. At the same time, my girlfriend told him to hold off while we discussed another property. He followed her suggestion, which is fine. Three days later, he texted telling me that he spoke to the seller's agent and made a suggestion of a $549,000 offer. On seeing that, I asked where he planned to get the additional $24,000. He informed me that it was just a discussion point. Ultimately, we all agreed to make an offer of $525,000 and to see the property today (Sunday 4/19) at 6:30 pm. He was there when we arrived, but as usual, he was on the phone with someone else and could not be bothered. On approaching his car, he gave the index finger sign indicated that he would be a few more minutes. My girlfriend, our dog, and I walked into the lobby to wait. The concierge informed us that the building has a no pets policy. Michael knows we have a dog. Again, he did not do his homework. I fired him, somewhat loudly, on the spot. Personally, he comes off as arrogant, sharing stories of his million dollar deals as though that makes him impressive. He spends time on the phone with other clients while showing homes to us. He is young and might grow out of this, but at present, he is poorly suited to this job.