Our "Stories from the Front Lines" series are 100% true and are accountings of scary reasons we need to exist.

Mr. Client wanted to sell his home, but first do a few repairs. One of his repairs was updating his old water heater. He bought a new one and installed it - not a difficult job. He used it for a few months while he did other repairs and finally listed his home. No issues with its function.

The home went under contract within a couple of days - sold to an investor who wanted to rent it out.

We were hired as the attorneys - not the real estate agents.

The agent's broker sent in an inspector, and the inspector said the water heater was not working. Thankfully, he included photos! We all knew that the water heater was new and working, so that was odd. However, the broker had a solution - I have a guy I will send over, he said, and for just $500, he'll make sure everything works and we'll be good to go.

As we looked closer at the photos, we realized that the inspector had pulled the fuse for the water heater. Upon further investigation, we also realized that this inspector and the repair person provided were the friend and the brother, respectiely, of the broker.

We called Blitch, the plumbing company, who came out, put the fuse back in, and verified that there was nothing wrong with the new water heater.

This was just a nepotism issue with a broker getting some quick money for his family. It happens very frequently. Thankfully this seller knew enough to bring this to us because he knew something wasn't right.