BCFSA Issues Licence Cancellations and $110K Fine for Deceptive Real Estate Investment

Wendy Mills and her Personal Real Estate Corporation committed professional misconduct and conduct unbecoming for deceiving a client in relation to false real estate investment opportunities.

Vancouver, July 24, 2024 – BC Financial Services Authority has cancelled the real estate trading services licences of Wendy Mills and Wendy Mills Personal Real Estate Corporation and issued a discipline penalty for professional misconduct, deceptive dealing, wrongful taking, and conduct unbecoming. The disciplinary measures are a result of Mills breaching her duties to a client and providing services other than on behalf of the brokerage where she was licensed.

Mills and her Personal Real Estate Corporation are subject to the following disciplinary measures for committing professional misconduct and conduct unbecoming:

• Effective July 18, 2024, both licences are cancelled;
• Jointly and severally liable to pay a $110,000 discipline penalty; and
• Jointly and severally liable to pay $5,000 in enforcement expenses.

The misconduct occurred between 2018 to 2020 when Mills approached a former client she had represented in a real estate sale in Vancouver, B.C., with an opportunity to purchase, renovate, and sell a property together. Mills received $60,000 from the client under this agreement and promised a $20,000 return on investment for a total of $80,000.

Mills made some initial inquiries about the property but did not purchase it, in part due to extraordinary personal and family stresses. Despite that fact, she falsely represented to her client that she had purchased, renovated, and sold the property for a profit. She paid $20,000 to the client in the summer and fall of 2018.

When the client asked for the $60,000 principal back, Mills pitched an agreement to roll the $60,000 into purchasing and renovating a second property with another $20,000 in promised profit. Again, Mills misrepresented to the client that she had purchased and renovated the second property, when she had not and had taken no steps to do so.

Following a series of requests for payment and commencement of a lawsuit by the client, Mills paid her client back $70,500 of the $80,000 promised – composed of the $60,000 initial investment and $20,000 in promised profit on the second property.

Mills did not inform her brokerage of the real estate services she was providing, including the written agreements she entered into with the client for each property, and did not deliver the client’s funds to her brokerage, as required.

BCFSA holds real estate licensees to high standards and does not tolerate dishonesty and deception, even where licensees are tempted or pressured by personal circumstances. The disciplinary measures reflect the licensee’s failure to meet core responsibilities.

Read the Consent Order for more details.

About BCFSA

BC Financial Services Authority is the province’s regulator for the financial services sector that helps to protect British Columbians during some of the most important financial decisions of their lives. As a Crown agency of the Government of British Columbia, BCFSA oversees credit unions, trust companies, insurance companies, pension plans, mortgage services, real estate services, real estate development marketing, and money services businesses. BCFSA also administers the Credit Union Deposit Insurance Corporation of British Columbia (“CUDIC”). BCFSA’s mission is to instill confidence in the financial services sector by focusing on the safety and soundness of regulated entities and consumer protection.

Media Contact:
Candace Jones
Director, Communications [email protected]
Visit: www.bcfsa.ca