Broker wins case against former client

One mortgage broker took a rate shopper to court and will be compensated for the detailed work he did

One mortgage broker took a rate shopper to court and will be compensated for the detailed work he did.

“(The) client has since agreed to pay over $4,000 in four installments of $1,000 each. Got the first one yesterday,” Graeme Moss, a broker with Verico Fair Mortgage Solutions, wrote in an email to MortgageBrokerNews.ca. “All is good.”

Over a year ago, a client contacted Moss to arrange a second mortgage.

“I knew he had gotten a quote from another broker. He said mine was a lot better but [that he] needed it done quickly; we got him the commitment, we got the full sign-back, so the lawyer had gone through a lot of work, and the lender went through quite a bit of work,” Moss told MortgageBrokerNews.ca last June. “From start to finish we aimed for a week to close a quarter of a million dollar second mortgage. On the Friday, he emailed asking me to call him.”

That’s when things went awry.

“He said the first mortgage that was cancelled came through. It was miraculously rejuvenated. The broker fee [for my deal] was $2,911 for a 250,000 second, which is very cheap,” Moss said. “He said to me, thanks for all the hard work, we’re going with the other guy.”

Moss explained to the client that, due to the work put in by himself, the lawyer, the lender, and all parties involved, the broker fee still needed to be paid.

The client refused and the matter was taken to small claims court in late June.

Due to the contract wording, the judge sided with Moss and the client has since agreed to pay him back for the work rendered.

But for Moss, the win isn’t about money.

"We transact five private mortgages per week and we have a good gauge of what is fair and reasonable,” he said. “The only reason I went to court was because of the way we jumped hoops then clients said, too bad. “(I) Would do again in a heartbeat; money is not a lot but satisfaction of justice being rendered is huge.”