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Third-Party Emails as Evidence?

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  • Third-Party Emails as Evidence?

    I have filed a motion to have my ex compensate me for trashing our home after I moved out 4 years ago. I have two emails I want to use as evidence. One is from the day before I moved out, from a real estate agent showing, what she believed the house could be listed at. The other is from a different agent stating they had talked to the agent my ex chose, and that the price he put on the house was inflated due to my ex insisting that is what WE wanted it listed at.

    Her lawyer is trying to have them thrown out as hearsay. Does anyone know of any case law that would allow for them to be used? They are important as it shows the house has dropped over $50,000 in value in the last 4 years and that she was pretending to represent me when she didn't have authorization.

  • #2
    I'm not aware of case law, but if you have access to a real estate agent they can pull up sales information for your neighbourhood around the time that you moved out to show what houses in the area sold for. It would go to confirm info from the first email.

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    • #3
      my personal experience with real estate agents is that they typically tell people their homes are worth a very high amount to get the listing. Once they have the listing and the poor home owner has been going in circles (trying to keep a place nice and tidy for a few months) the agent then goes back to the owner and has them lower the price. This usually happens just before the listing expires.

      I wouldn't put any weight on anything a realtor has to say.

      Why has the matter taken 4 years to settle?

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      • #4
        I think you would have difficulty arguing that a four-year-old email from a real estate agent hoping to get the listing represents an objective estimate of the home's actual worth. (If this was a real estate appraiser who didn't have an interest in possibly getting your or your ex as a client, it might be a different matter). A composite drawn from the actual selling prices of comparable houses in your neighbourhood four years ago would probably be more useful.

        Why does it matter how much the house has dropped in value in the last four years? The important point is what it was worth on the date of separation, which I assume was the day you moved out.

        Arguing over whether your ex is responsible for the decrease in price of the house strikes me as a bonanza for lawyers. (What about real estate bubbles? What's happened to the surrounding neighbourhood that might affect the value of the house? Etc). You need to come up with a figure representing the value of the house as of separation, and that's what goes into the equalization.

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        • #5
          Originally posted by arabian View Post
          my personal experience with real estate agents is that they typically tell people their homes are worth a very high amount to get the listing. Once they have the listing and the poor home owner has been going in circles (trying to keep a place nice and tidy for a few months) the agent then goes back to the owner and has them lower the price. This usually happens just before the listing expires.

          I wouldn't put any weight on anything a realtor has to say.

          Why has the matter taken 4 years to settle?
          I totally agree. I can list my house for any insane amount that I want...it doesn't mean a thing. Its what houses have been selling for that matters.

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