August 28, 2018
RECO has received questions about what this means for compliance with advertising requirements under the Real Estate and Business Brokers Act, 2002 (REBBA). The short answer is that there is no impact because the ruling applies to information that is not considered advertising.
To understand the issue, it’s important to define what a VOW is as defined in the Competition Tribunal decision: “a password-protected area of a brokerage’s website where consumers can access and search a database containing MLS information.”
Some have asked how this could comply with REBBA, which prohibits the advertising of the “sold” price without the parties having provided written consent to do so. However, the Competition Tribunal’s decision determined that sold information provided on a password-protected VOW does not constitute advertising, since providing that same information in other formats (such as a Comparative Market Analysis), or providing other MLS information, does not constitute advertising, either.
The order was upheld on appeal to the Federal Court of Appeal. The Supreme Court of Canada, by denying leave to appeal, has affirmed the order.
While the decision enables the posting of a property’s sold price on a VOW, the price of a conditional offer should not be shared.
To summarize: the Competition Tribunal’s decision applies specifically to data published on a password-protected VOW, and not to advertising. As such, the existing REBBA rules regarding advertising continue to apply. Without the written consent of the parties to the agreement, registrants must not include in any advertisement, details of an agreement of purchase and sale, such as:
Advertising such information without written consent is a breach of REBBA, and RECO will deal with it accordingly.