Century 21 agent banned after fake sale contracts on Perth homes

Gayla Currie, who worked for Century 21 Max Comben real estate agency in Perth, has been caught presenting more than 20 fake contracts for fake property sales.

The real estate agent has been banned from working in the industry for life after being found guilty of fabricating purchase offers on numerous properties.

The forged contracts pretended to be prospective buyers.

The punishment was imposed by the State Administrative Tribunal on Currie, who worked as a sales representative in 2015 and 2016.

Ms Currie began working for the agency as a sales representative in February 2015 and was supervised by Mr Comben. Ms Currie held a sales representative certificate from October 2012 to October 2015 but failed to renew her certificate of registration until February 2016. She continued her sales activities with the agency between October 2015 and February 2016, despite not holding a certificate of registration.

Currie’s employer and sales supervisor Maxwell Comben were also fined by the SAT for breaching the Real Estate and Business Agents Act.

The SAT found as supervisor, Comben had failed to notice that signatures on the offers were in Currie’s handwriting, finance letters from banks were forged, phone numbers were made up and none of the sales ever settled.

Consumer Protection commissioner David Hillyard said there had been a serious lack of proper supervision on Comben’s part.

"Property owners who put their trust in the agency have endured great inconvenience and financial disadvantage,” he said.

Max has been selling in the Real Estate industry for over 41 years and all of these 41 years have been in the local area. 

Max Comden commenced selling in 1975. 

Max has been inducted into the prestigious Century 21 Hall Of Fame which is the highest individual award offered by Century 21. He is a "Centurion" level salesperson putting him in the top 2% if sales people in the largest real estate system world wide.

Currie’s employer Sakar Pty Ltd, trading as Century 21 Max Comben, was fined $2,000 and sales supervisor Maxwell Comben was fined $3,000 by the SAT for breaching the Real Estate and Business Agents Act by failing to exercise due care, skill and diligence and continuing to employ a sales representative in the time period that the sales representative’s certificate of registration had expired and was therefore no longer valid. The agency and Mr Comben were reprimanded and ordered to also pay costs of $1,200.

The SAT findings:

• Sixteen fake contracts of offer and acceptance to the owner of a Westminster property between May 2015 and February 2016;
• Two fake contracts of offer and acceptance to the owner of a Balcatta property in October 2015 and January 2016;
• Three fake contracts of offer and acceptance to the owner of a Morley property between December 2015 and March 2016; and
• One fake contract of offer and acceptance to the owners of a Stirling property in February 2016.