In case you need any more reason to distrust real estate agents, a Sydney realtor not only landed himself in deep shit with angry Facebook commenters, but also been suspended from his job after he basically admitted to having disdain for renters. Honestly, this is why no one likes y’all!
The drama began when Abhnit Kumar, a 23-year-old real estate agent from Ray White Macarthur Group in Campbelltown, posted about a home he helped sell for $958,000 on his Facebook page.
“The market doesn’t dictate your home’s price, the agent does,” Kumar wrote alongside his sale, encouraging homeowners to reach out if they wanted to sell.
Given we are currently suffering a housing crisis that is seeing homes sell for exorbitant prices because of high demand and landlord greed, appearing to admit to purposefully inflating house prices above market price is… not good.
One Facebook commenter asked why Kumar was “artificially inflating house prices during a period of high inflation”.
Kumar, not having yet picked up on the scent of danger crackling through the air, brazenly admitted prioritising money over people and told the commenter he could “maximise on the profits you can make” when selling their “biggest asset”. Big mistake, buddy.
HMMMM. (Source: Facebook).
The commenter was obviously not impressed by the idea of holding the basic right to shelter ransom to maximise wealth, and responded with a (in my opinion, quite polite) no thanks.
“You said you inflate prices, so that the market is overpriced. Your words, not mine, I know when I’m in the market for a house I will be staying well away from your agency,” they wrote.
“It’s no wonder real estate agents are one of the least trusted professions.”
Aaaand this is where the drama really kicked off, because Kumar then responded: “Hey buddy you must clearly be a renter. Please stay away from my agency as we would not like to deal with people like you.”
People like who, Kumar?? Renters? People who don’t want to extort those desperate for shelter?
Naturally, the comments took a nosedive as the real estate agent was then accused of being anti-renter, and by extension, anti-poor people. The backlash prompted him to apologise though, and he deleted the post.
“I am in the wrong, I should have handled the situation better. It was uncalled for my comments,” he wrote.
He also told he was “deeply sorry for the offence and upset caused” and said he was “very remorseful” for his comments.
Things don’t end here, though: the online hullabaloo was clearly picked up on by Kumar’s agency, who immediately suspended him and kicked off an internal investigation.
“At Ray White Macarthur Group we pride ourselves on customer service. We respect and value each and every one of our tenants,” the agency said in a Facebook statement.
“The views of Abhnit Kumar do not align with the values of our group. As a result, we’ve made the business decision to suspend his employment immediately while we conduct an internal investigation.”
The comments of the Facebook statement are even more pissed off, with some calling Kumar’s comments “disgraceful” and “unprofessional”.
The wildest part to me about all this is the real estate agency’s claims that Kumar wasn’t acting like he was supposed to.
Just last year a Ray White real estate agency in Queensland was exposed for . I’m pretty sure we’re all aware inflating house price is common practice among real estate agents looking for a juicy commission.
Let’s not pretend Kumar wasn’t behaving exactly like the culture in the real estate world has taught him to.
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