A real estate agent has been counselled after sending a shocking late night text labelling a client a ‘pig’.
Gold Coast couple Giorgina and Tom Stewart claimed they had received the insulting message from Coastal Property real estate agent Christine Tucker.
The couple had engaged the agency to sell their property and had reached a settlement when they received a message at 11.45pm on September 13.
‘Pig. Shame. Absolutely disgust how you left that home,’ the text read.
‘The oven wasn’t even cleaned. Brian advised me what kind of person you are. Your husband should be ashamed. He’s class.
‘I’ll be telling the neighbours. Pig. Being a female just thought you’d like to know that. My mum taught me cleanliness, not sure about yours.’
Ms Stewart said she was ‘dumbfounded’ by the text, as the buyers of their property had accepted the pre-settlement inspection of the home just the day before.
‘When selling your house you don’t have to do a bond clean like with a rental, but we left the house clean and tidy,’ she said.
Ms Stewart said during the sales process, which began in May, Ms Tucker had been ‘pleasant’.
‘We had signed a contract with her and we needed the house to be sold as we had purchased elsewhere,’ she said.
Ms Stewart said when she had not received an apology from Ms Tucker, she complained to Coastal Property managing director Dane Atherton on September 16.
She said Mr Atherton replied in writing and ‘conveyed my disgust and apologised’, the Gold Coast Bulletin reported.
Mr Atherton told Ms Stewart he had handled the matter internally.
‘I am confident our measures will ensure Christine will learn from the experience and will not behave in this manner again,’ he wrote.
‘Once again I ask you to accept my sincerest apologies.’
Mr Atherton said he repeatedly apologised to Ms Stewart.
‘It was viewed as unacceptable behaviour and it was dealt with internally where we had counselling and warnings to the agent,’ he said.
Mr Atherton said he would not sack Ms Tucker.
‘She is a human being who did something wrong – and that is not how I work,’ he said.
‘I had felt my conversation (with the complainant) was well received.’
Daily Mail Australia contacted Coastal Property for comment.
