Realtor Shows Home – Stuff Goes Missing. Who Is To Blame?

So some friends of mine Brad and Teresa who live in Arizona, put their house on the market recently. They are moving to Spokane. They prepped and “staged” (dressed it up for sale) the house and gave it a professional ‘Rona cleaning.

The realtor set up a bunch of appointments as there was pretty high demand. Since this was being done during quarantine, Brad and Teresa stayed in a hotel for the weekend leaving the house for the realtor to show. Before leaving for the weekend on Friday, their Real Estate Agent told them to hide or put away anything valuable.

Makes sense right? If you are going to have people traipsing through your home, you don’t want to invite temptation to strangers.

Well one thing that they didn't think to put away, was a bottle of Macallan 18 Year-Old Scotch. After coming back on Monday, Brad and Teresa were a bit preoccupied with the sale, which makes sense. After a few days and after over a dozen showings, Brad realized his $300+ bottle of scotch was gone from the bar on its’ perch.

Now, he doesn't know what day it went missing, but he's FULLY blaming the Real Estate Agent for not watching the "potential buyers" when viewing their house. The realtor has denied responsibility, but has offered to pay to replace the bottle.

The Realtor and the company they work for, are stating that they are officially not responsible for the loss. The Realtor states, “I did ask that you put away valuables before showing.”

Brad and Teresa say their house was in the realtors care for the weekend and trusted their property was in good hands.

So who is in the right? The realtor? Or Brad and Teresa? Should they get a new realtor? Should the realtor drop the listing? What is the protocol here? What would you do?

All My Best,

The JimShow