Anyone who is dissatisfied with a home sale can turn to FMI.

Their mission is to check that brokers follow the laws and regulations that exist.

In the last three years, the number of notifications has been on average 560 per year, but this year the authority had already received almost 1,000 notifications in October.

A problem for the industry

The most common reason for reporting is the so-called cover price, ie that the broker must have set a too low price for the home to get more people into the bidding, and in that way be able to raise the price.

- It is obvious that many consumers have questions, and maybe even feel dissatisfied with the real estate service because of this, and it is a problem that the industry needs to take seriously, says Joakim Lusensky, who is head of analysis at Mäklarsamfundet.

At the same time, he believes that a very small proportion of all consumers choose to report.

- This is a couple of per mille of all housing transactions that lead to a notification in terms of cover price.

From that perspective, it is a fairly small problem, says Joakim Lusensky.

Illegal with cap prices

A broker who uses misleading price information violates both the broker practice and the Marketing Act.

At the same time, it is difficult to establish that the broker has deliberately set a price that is too low, and it is therefore unusual for a report to lead to a penalty for the broker.



But sometimes a warning is issued, and in a unique case this summer, the Real Estate Inspectorate decided for the first time to revoke the identification of a broker who had systematically used cover prices.



Why the reports have increased so sharply this year is difficult to establish, says Gunilla Paulsson, head of authority at FMI, but apart from the fact that more people may have become aware that it is possible to report, she believes that the coronavirus is part of the explanation.



- Something has happened now during the pandemic.

We believe that there is some connection to the fact that it was thought that prices would go down, but in fact they have rather increased.

And the brokers may not have really been involved in this then and set too low prices, says Gunilla Paulsson.