Unethical? I think so.  Immoral? Pretty sure!  Illegal? Biggest question yet!

 I am in the middle of a short sale. I represent the buyer. The listing agent calls me and says we have short sale approval, move forward with inspection/appraisal. I ask for the short sale approval letter, which he flat out refuses to provide.  He says that the approval letter is between his seller and their bank. I explained that since the contract says 'subject to third party approval', it is part of the agreement and must be provided.

Since he was still refusing, I wrote an addendum to remove the third party approval. All of this seems OK, right?

It did until I had a clear to close for my people. He said the sellers arent' ready. (What?!?)  They have moved out of the house and they are now Not Ready?  This seemed pretty strange to me. The timing seemed to be right so there wouldn't be any problems with closing. I knew there had to be some clues in my file that I had been missing.

Once I went back through the contract and all of the addenda, I noticed the signatures didn't jib.

After jumping up and down with both title companies, I finally have the full story.

Our PA was not signed by the sellers, but by a LLC that was formed a couple of days before they listed the house on the market. The primary person of that LLC is one of the Attorney's that is negotiating the short sale.

The listing broker still seems to think we are clueless as to what is going on.

According to the title company, they do not even have short sale approval yet. Why in the world would he have told us to move forward with the appraisal/inspection then?

I think it is illegal to have someone sign a purchase agreement that does not have any ownership in the house. Period.

I am anxious to talk to my E & O Atty. on Tuesday to find what he says about this whole mess.