The case I was expected to peer review for this month's grievance committee meeting was so bizarre that I actually called up the person at the association just to make sure it wasn't some sort of early April Fool's joke. She just sighed heavily and thanked me for taking this one on.
"Please stop giving me the weird ones," I replied.
"It wasn't the weirdest one this month."
She was right.
Here was my case. Two people who reside in Arizona were renting a cabin in the woods somewhere back East this past December. They didn't show up. One of these folks was an Arizona real estate agent. The cabin owner wants compensation. So, he sent an ethics complaint to the Association. We had to decide if an ethics violation had been committed.
I had a real problem with this and I said so. This case had to do with an agent renting real property, therefore one could argue there technically there might be some sort of code of ethics violation. But where do we draw the line? As a real-life example, I have a bankruptcy that involved real property. I didn't fulfill my contracts and obligation. Was I in violation of a code of ethics complaint under the circumstances?
As it turns out, we as a committee, decided that this was a civil complaint and dismissed the case. But it brought up a lively discussion. I like lively discussions--especially about contracts. I don't like punitive cabin owners who have nothing better to do than write up complaints against folks who owe them less than $30. Our committee doesn't enforce contracts. The cabin owner wasn't going to get his money any faster by coming to us and complaining. I am not sure what he was expecting to get, actually. But he will be disappointed when the letter comes saying we didn't feel he had grounds for an ethics complaint.
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