Creating outbidding by displaying a property below its market value, organizing bogus offers or bluffing is prohibited by law. A new decision which officially bans the former star broker of the show for life Numbers 1 at CASA Christine Girouard comes to remind all brokers in Quebec.
Posted at 10:38 a.m.
A decision to deregister for life is rare and difficult to obtain from the disciplinary committee of the Organisme d’autoréglementation du courtageimmobilier du Québec (OACIQ).
It took two disciplinary complaints from the OACIQ trustee and an agreement between the lawyers of both parties for the committee to arrive at this sentence for Christine Girouard.
The real estate brokers who recently received this ultimate sanction had committed serious acts and were convicted during a criminal trial.
Last August, the former president of Sutton Quebec Christophe José Folla was disbarred for life and sentenced to five years in prison for causing arson at his competitors. For his part, Francis Vallée was also disbarred for life in January 2023 for his sexual behavior and inappropriate comments towards female clients. He was convicted of sexual assault in 2021 at the Gatineau courthouse, but requested an appeal of the decision.
“We are happy that justice has been done”
Former star real estate broker Christine Girouard was recalled to court last fall after an initial 15-year license suspension and a $50,000 fine for her orchestration of a revealed phony bidding scheme by The Press.
This time, the lawyers for both parties agreed that Mme Girouard pleads guilty and the sanction to be imposed on him. “My decision to enter this plea was made freely, without threat or coercion, and represents my will,” Mr.me Girouard in the legal document.
Contacted by The Pressthe Professional Association of Real Estate Brokers of Quebec (APCIQ) affirms that “the majority of the industry is very happy”, because it does not want to have members like Mme Girouard “which overshadow the work of the vast majority of other brokers”.
“We are happy that justice is done, because it can send a message that we must carry out our duties ethically,” said Jonathan Vincent, interim CEO and vice-president of commercial affairs, in an interview. of the APCIQ.
“If this decision can put an end to this saga, which has damaged the image of the profession, I can tell you that everyone will be happy if we can move on. »
The reasons for the lifetime radiation of Christine Girouard
Christine Girouard admitted that during the years 2021 and 2022, she implemented a stratagem in order to generate bidding wars by marketing four buildings at sale prices below their market value, “thus contravening each of these occasions, in articles 62 and 69 of the Regulation respecting the conditions for carrying out a brokerage operation, the ethics of brokers and advertising », Indicates the decision of the disciplinary committee.
The former star broker also recognizes that during the years 2021 and 2022, she “falsely represented to the real estate brokers of promising buyers that they had to increase the offered price of their clients’ promise to purchase or that they had to offer a given price when the amount offered was already the highest among the other promises to purchase received, in the context of eight real estate transactions.
The nine new cases of this second complaint, which led to the lifetime disbarment of Mme Girouard, were all reported to the OACIQ on the same day of the publication of the first report of The Press published on May 17, 2023, the next day and following each follow-up article on this case, we can read in the document “Decision on guilt and sanction” of the disciplinary committee.
The 50-page document details each fraudulent transaction.
Consumers bought their property for $10,000, $20,000, $25,000 and $34,000 more, because Mme Girouard wrongly made them believe that they had to improve their offer.
Bluff on the menu to sell his parents’ house
When his parents’ house was put up for sale, the twists and turns of which were captured by the show’s camera Numbers 1 at HOME, consumers have been cheated.
First of all, the home’s listing price of $549,700 is $75,300 below the comparable lowest of Mme Girouard, indicates the disciplinary committee document.
This strategy resulted in the generation of 32 purchase promises and six bonuses with a gap of $220,411 between the marketing price and the highest offer, specifies the document.
Then, the cheated consumers made an offer of $755,111, which was already $25,000 higher than the second-place bidder. Now, Mme Girouard contacted their broker claiming that they were in second position and that they needed to improve their offer. Because of false representations on the part of Mme Girouard, so they offered $770,111. Mme Girouard even tried to obtain a second bonus, but the buyers refused.
“The parties’ attorneys have done a colossal job in this case. They submitted more than 2,000 pages of documentary evidence as evidence and wrote a joint summary of the facts comprising 155 paragraphs…” writes Vice-President Me Daniel M. Fabien, who rendered his decision on November 27, 2024.
Christine Girouard “is a dishonest broker who profoundly lacks probity,” maintains the committee in the publication.
Following the joint recommendations of the two parties, the committee decided to permanently suspend its license, to prohibit the issuance of any category of permits as well as the issuance of permits to an agency in which it would be a majority shareholder or director. It must also pay all costs of the proceeding, including those of publishing the notice of suspension in a newspaper. Christine Girouard could still be a minority shareholder in a real estate agency.
The spouse and former business partner of Mme Girouard, Jonathan Dauphinais-Fortin, with whom she has since had a child, was sentenced by her professional court to a $10,000 fine and 10-year license suspension last September.
“Life will reward you soon enough”
While the buyer cheated by the couple because of a bogus offer is still waiting to be reimbursed by the Real Estate Brokerage Compensation Fund (FICI), Christine Girouard continues to provide advice on real estate, entrepreneurship and life in videos posted on Instagram.
“To the detriment of your mental and physical health, let go of situations over which you have no control. Life will reward you quite quickly,” advises Christine Girouard in a publication dated December 9.
