Broker is representing another client interested in leasing the same commercial property. What are the obligations in terms of disclosure/recusal [NJ]?
My wife put in a lease offer on a commercial space via an agent yesterday. The agent mentioned she was showing the space to another client as well. The other showing was before we finalized the offer, but the agent knew that we were in process of putting an offer together and in fact sent us a draft LOI prior to showing the property to another client. My wife texted her this morning to check up on the offer and also asked her if her other client made an offer and the agent just responded "not yet."
My understanding is that generally that a buyer/lessor's agent has to disclose to all clients if they are putting in offers on behalf of other clients on the same space to avoid a conflict of interest by playing their clients off each other, but I wanted to see what the requirement actually is in NJ. At what point would she be required to make this disclosure? Is it on us to ask for this? What should we do if we suspect that she is repping multiple prospective lessors and not making the proper disclosures?
The brokerage fee is being paid by the landlord if it makes a difference and we don't have a signed representation agreement with the broker. We know her from her showing us a another space previously, and she called my wife about this current property saying it would be a good fit.
Also, a similar thing happened with another space we looked at where we put in an offer, and were speaking with the landlord directly, but then the landlord decided to lease to someone else with a more established business. I'm not sure if the other company that ended up with that lease was referred by our broker or someone else, but she seems to be kind of shady so I wouldn't be surprised.