THE Council for Estate Agencies (CEA) yesterday said it has misplaced 125 application forms due to an administrative oversight.

It is working with these estate agents to get them registered as soon as possible. Meanwhile, the agents have been issued provisional registrations and are allowed to practise.

The CEA also said that ‘as a gesture of goodwill’, 813 of 1,736 property agents whose applications are pending approval can act provisionally till the end of this month.

These agents either submitted their application forms after the Nov 30, 2010 deadline, or did not have their forms in order.

Another 923 agents’ applications are pending approval, but this group will not get the grace period. These are people who either did not declare criminal convictions or who gave inaccurate information on their bankruptcy status. They can re-apply or appeal to be registered.

The government agency acknowledged problems such as missing forms and registration delays, and apologised for the inconvenience caused.

The CEA was set up in October last year to police real estate agents and agencies following long-running complaints about unethical practices. It has a staff of 33 and started operations on Jan 1.

Addressing recent news reports that it was unable to cope with the workload, Ms Purnima Shantilal, CEA’s director of licensing and investigations, said a large part of the bottleneck stems from agents going to the office themselves, rather than letting their agencies handle the applications.

A total of 1,401 estate agencies have applied for registration as of Jan 7. Of these, 1,288, or 92 per cent, were approved.

Three were rejected and 48 had incomplete applications. The applications of 62 agencies are pending approval because they were submitted late.

As for individual agents, CEA received 31,288 applications, of which 28,766, or 92 per cent, were approved.

A total of 786 people were rejected for various reasons. Most had not taken CEA-endorsed exams or completed at least three property transactions over the last two years.

The rest did not meet CEA’s ‘fit and proper’ criteria. They include people with serious criminal convictions, including fraud and dishonesty, ‘in the recent past’.

CEA clarified that it considers applications from people with previous criminal convictions carefully and on a case-by-case basis.

It added that undischarged bankrupts are not automatically disqualified. Again, applications are assessed on a case-by-case basis and it has accepted the registration of undischarged bankrupts with the relevant supporting documents.

While estate agents and agency bosses were relieved that there is some reprieve for those who have not been registered, they wondered why there are still delays.

Mr Jimmy Ng, director of Premiere Realty, said his company had not been placed on CEA’s public register last week.

‘After chasing CEA and going down to their offices a few times, my company finally appeared on the website on Sunday,’ he said. ‘But the delay has caused some of my 30 agents to not be able to clinch their deals.’

Ms Janice Chan, director of Asia Breeze housing agency, said: ‘There is always a long waiting time for its hotline, and some of the staff do not seem adequately briefed.’

Others were more sympathetic, and attributed the problems to teething issues. Dennis Wee Group director Chris Koh said the one-month extension should help clear the backlog.

Mr Eugene Lim, associate director at ERA Asia Pacific, the firm with the biggest number of registered agents, said it bodes well for the industry that CEA has acknowledged that it has problems and is working quickly to resolve them.

Source: STraits Times, 10 Jan 2011

Long queues at its HDB Hub office to settle licence queries, disputes

THE new statutory board in charge of regulating and licensing property agents here had a rough first day of business yesterday.

The Toa Payoh premises of the Council for Estate Agencies (CEA) was thronged with people, mainly disgruntled property agents or their bosses, who had shown up to ask about licences that had yet to be issued or sort out property transaction disputes.

The machine issuing queue numbers was working overtime, and several people saw a few hours go up in smoke as they waited in line.

About 30 people were still there when The Straits Times dropped in at 5pm.

Premiere Realty chief executive Jimmy Ng was there to find out why his 30 agents, approved as practising agents last year, had yet to receive their licences.

After trying unsuccessfully to call the CEA’s hotline for two hours, he turned up at its offices in HDB Hub at 11am.

He ended up spending the afternoon there, with his number finally called four hours later – only for him to be told that more waiting was in store: It would take another three days for the CEA to process the licences.

Sounding irritated, he said: ‘I’m running a business. I have five cases on hand right now that I can’t work on because we can’t do anything until we get our licences.

‘Making us wait this long is just ridiculous. Our clients will be very unhappy with us,’ he complained.

The CEA, set up last year following long-running complaints about a lack of professionalism and unethical practices among property agents, required Singapore’s 32,800 existing property agents to register with it.

About 27,800 did so, and after the CEA had them sit and pass examinations or show they had brokered at least three deals in the past two years, it entered their names into a public online database.

Among the regulations the CEA started enforcing at the start of the new year is one that requires all agents to be licensed in order to carry out property transactions.

At what was supposed to have been the close of the business day yesterday, some people were seen dozing on the couches in the CEA’s reception area, while others stood glumly in the lift lobby comparing queue numbers.

Two counters in the reception area, a makeshift one outside and some offices at the back of the premises were handling the visitors’ queries.

HSR Property Group agent Sharon Chong, 39, who waited more than three hours for advice on a transaction dispute, said: ‘The wait is agonising, but there’s clearly a bottleneck, because they don’t have enough people to handle our queries.

‘I’m tired of waiting, but my case is urgent and I need the answer today.’

The CEA, responding to questions from The Straits Times, said it put six customer service officers and a manager on duty yesterday to handle queries on licences or accept re-submitted applications that were previously incomplete.

About 200 people showed up based on queue numbers, it said.

Said its spokesman: ‘We have placed a priority on handling licensing and registration queries, and are beefing up counter service to register those who walk in as soon as possible if they are eventually found to be eligible.’

She added that there were no plans to open more counters in the office.

Source: Straits Times, 4 Jan 2011

THE Council for Estate Agencies (CEA) will launch a scheme to resolve disputes between consumers and agents next month.

At present, this can be done only by organisations such as the Consumers Association of Singapore, which needs both parties to agree to participate.

Under the new rules, agents and their firms must take part. The consumer chooses the dispute resolution centre. The consumer and property firm each pay 50 per cent for mediation and the firm may pay more for arbitration.

Source: Straits Times, 30 Dec 2010

ONE applicant was once jailed for seven years for having sex with a child. Others had histories of drug trafficking, illegal money-lending, stealing and fraud-related offences.

Of the estimated 32,800 existing property agents who applied for registration with the Council for Estate Agencies (CEA) earlier this year, about 27,800 passed muster.

So far, CEA said it has rejected 210 applicants based on their past convictions or involvement in court cases, while others might have dropped out because of tightening regulations.

From Saturday, all new and existing agents have to be registered. It is part of the Government’s first foray into regulating and disciplining agents in the real estate industry – the sixth most-complained-about sector last year.

Those who made the cut will have their details displayed for the public on CEA’s website. Only these agents are allowed to work. The council has the authority to fine, suspend or revoke the licences of those who break the rules.

The public register will display the agent’s name, licence number and a recent photo. It will also show information on the 1,190 estate agency businesses.

Agents who have passed a recognised industry exam, such as the Common Examination for House Agents, have had their registrations approved.

CEA will also register those who have done at least three property deals over the last two years. But these agents will be granted only a one-year provisional licence and need to pass the Real Estate Salesperson (RES) exam by Dec 31 next year if they want to continue practising.

CEA is also launching a dispute resolution scheme next month.

This process aims to provide a means of resolving issues such as contractual disputes between consumers and agents. The agent involved will be compelled to participate in it.

Barely two months after it started operating, CEA has already received 228 complaints – about 114 a month.

Real estate agents and home buyers interviewed by The Straits Times welcomed the tightening of regulations.

Prospective home buyer Vanessa Chew, 26, said: ‘Many of us, either rightly or wrongly, look to real estate agents for guidance and information. The new regulations will hopefully ensure that real estate agents are in a better position to assist us and minimise any potential conflicts of interests.’

Dennis Wee Group (DWG) director Chris Koh said a ‘substantial’ number of agents still made the cut. He said measures like the standardisation of buyer and seller agreements will help improve the industry. Almost all the 2,400 agents DWG submitted to CEA qualified.

Mr Koh added: ‘The public registry will boost consumer confidence… buyers will know they are working with bona fide personnel.’

PropNex also had most of its 4,000 agents qualify. But spokesman Adam Tan said Singapore’s total number of CEA-registered agents is likely to drop, in part because of the difficulty agents possessing provisional licences might have with passing the required exams.

About 6,000 property agents have a one-year provisional licence.

Mr Tan added: ‘People who want to join the real estate industry now will have to be serious about it as a career.’

CEA said property developers and estate agents marketing land banking products are not affected by the new rules.

Source: Straits Times, 30 Dec 2010