The Real Estate Council of Ontario (RECO) has issued an order to freeze the bank accounts of Oakville, Ont.-based Rexig Realty Investment Group. The regulator has also issued a proposal to revoke the registrations of both the brokerage and Broker Paul Poliszot, the brokerage’s director and president. 

The measures, announced Oct. 30 under the Trust in Real Estate Services Act, 2002 (TRESA), are intended to protect consumer deposits. RECO says the freeze order prevents funds from being withdrawn from the brokerage’s bank accounts. It uses freeze orders “when necessary” to ensure that money held in brokerage accounts is not at risk of being misused.

Rexig, which employs 10 agents according to the regulator, remains open. RECO says the broker of record will oversee remaining transactions and facilitate the transfer of agents and active listings to other brokerages.

Appeal process

A proposal to revoke registration is issued when the Registrar believes a brokerage or registrant is not entitled to registration. The decision can be appealed within 15 days. If no appeal is filed, Rexig and Poliszot’s registrations will be terminated, and they will no longer be permitted to trade in real estate.

Poliszot did not respond to Real Estate Magazine’s request for comment.

In a 2021 interview with REM, Poliszot described his firm as working “much like a real estate investment bank,” advising smaller investors — such as medical professionals, lawyers and entrepreneurs — on building real estate portfolios.

Province reviewing iPro audit

The enforcement action comes as the Ontario government confirms it has received Dentons Canada’s audit into RECO’s handling of the iPro Realty scandal, which involved the alleged misuse of millions in trust funds. Minister Stephen Crawford has said the findings will be made public once his review is complete, though no timeline has been given.

Consumers and agents affected by the Rexig freeze order are encouraged to contact RECO.

Editor’s note: Realty Executives has no affiliation with Rexig Realty Investment Group Ltd. A previous reference has been removed to avoid confusion.

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A nearly 20,000-square-foot lakefront luxury home with all the trimmings may be what dreams are made of – but a $39-million listing won’t sell itself.

Matthew Regan and Alex Irish hold the listing for Ontario’s highest-priced home currently listed on Realtor.ca. 

2054 Lakeshore Road East, a 1.6-acre estate in an affluent southeast Oakville neighbourhood, had been on the market for one week as of Monday. 

While the home itself may be pristine – with its seven bedrooms, “Bellagio”-inspired fountain and waterfall, infinity pool, and manicured grounds – getting it sold will require Regan and Irish to get their hands dirty. 

Tapping the right circles

Regan said the seller came to Regan Irish & Associates, which is under the banner of Re/Max Escarpment Realty Inc., seeking representation with both domestic and international reach.

“You have to cast a pretty wide net,” he said, noting the monumental pricetag. 

Most listings follow a passive formula: put the property on MLS and wait for the right buyer to appear. 

“Where that falls short on a property like this is that it’s a very specific buyer. There are not many of them out there,” said Regan.

For a high-end home, the strategy flips. Instead of waiting, Regan and Irish have taken a hands-on approach, built on 60 years of combined experience.

“You’re really relying on a network,” Regan said. “If I call up an agent in Victoria or Vancouver, the chances are they know who we are because of the type of real estate we sell—and I know them.” This credibility opens doors to one-on-one conversations with agents who have access to affluent buyers in markets from Vancouver to Chicago to Los Angeles.

That outreach matters. A current prospect from Los Angeles, whose wife is Canadian, is seriously considering the property, said Regan.

With the Canadian dollar low against the U.S. dollar, the home becomes an even more attractive asset for American buyers, he said.

Not your typical open house

Rather than a public open house, the team hosted a unique, invitation-only agent event. Phones were not allowed inside the property, ensuring privacy for both the home and its owners. The gathering was professionally catered, creating a refined, memorable atmosphere.

What made it stand out even more was the scheduling. Showings were arranged by time slot, allowing the team to carefully manage foot traffic. This not only ensured the experience felt exclusive for guests, but also addressed security concerns that come with a property of this calibre.

The online element

Regan said search engine optimization plays a major role in attracting the right buyers online. “SEO is a big thing,” he said. The goal is to highlight the property’s most distinctive features in a way that makes it easy for potential buyers to find.

This home offers rare amenities that stand out in any search—an indoor golf simulator, an elevator to all five levels, an in-home movie theater, and a fully equipped gym accessible from the primary bedroom. 

By using targeted keywords tied to these amenities, the marketing ensures the listing appears in searches made by buyers specifically looking for such features. 

Quick close, or long game?

When it comes to selling a property at this level, timelines can be unpredictable. “There’s no one answer to that,” Regan said. This is the type of home a buyer of this affluence will view as a generational purchase—an opportunity that doesn’t come along very often, he said.

That can lead to a quick sale. Just one week on the market, the property already has two qualified buyers showing interest, including a second showing. For many in this price range, the home becomes part of a broader portfolio—“a crown jewel” as Regan calls it—which can prompt a faster decision.

But the flip side is that it could also take longer. The ideal buyer may not even be aware the property is for sale yet.

“Sometimes the perfect buyer doesn’t even know they want to buy something right now,” Regan said. It’s only when they come across the listing that they think, this looks interesting—let’s go see it.

Courtney Zwicker

Courtney Zwicker is a digital reporter and associate editor for REM. Based in Atlantic Canada, she has over a decade of experience covering daily business news.

The post On the market: $39M Oakville estate appeared first on REM.

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Most Southern Ontario Realtors seem to agree that having one MLS system serving all boards would be an ideal situation. Members would pay just one membership fee to their local board – no need for dual memberships, buying subscriptions to other boards’ systems or interboard listings.

But when it comes to how this single system would be administered, there’s a sharp divide between TRREB and just about everyone else. In April, Information Technology Systems Ontario, which provides MLS listing content for 21 member boards and has a sharing agreement six other boards, sent an open letter to TRREB, asking it to share its data.

More recently, TRREB ended a data swap arrangement with the Oakville, Milton and District Real Estate Board. That board is currently considering what MLS service provider it will use, with a decision expected by the end of August. Joining TRREB as a partner board is one of the options that OMDREB is considering, but the board was unhappy with the way TRREB described the end of the data swap agreement to members.

An irritant for members of boards near Toronto is when TRREB members list out-of-town properties on TRREB’s MLS but not on the local board’s system. Recently a petition was launched by Blue Mountain area Realtors, asking CREA to make it mandatory to list homes on the board where the property is located.

“TRREB’s membership works across the province, as they are licensed to do. I think a cohesive MLS system, especially with the contiguous market, really makes a lot of sense,” says Crigger.

TRREB runs the largest MLS in the country, with more than 60,000 users. “I think TRREB offers an incredible opportunity for boards across the province to benefit from the extensive staffing and the massive investments in technology” that TRREB is putting into its MLS system, he says. “We have an incredible amount of experience and we have drafted and continued to update our rules on a regular basis. And that work is done by a dedicated group of volunteers who then make recommendations to our Board of Directors. The approach is very grassroots.

“At the end of the day, there’s one member paying membership dues,” says Crigger. “Our goal is always to look at how we provide that member with the highest possible value for the money spent.”

TRREB has had partner board arrangements with the Durham Region Association of Realtors and the Brampton Real Estate Board for more than 20 years, and recently the Northumberland Hills Association of Realtors also joined. The agreement allows members of all these boards to have full access to all listings on the board, under one set of rules and bylaws.

TRREB has made presentations to a number of other boards to become partner boards, and some of these discussions are ongoing. However, some boards are unwilling to give up control of their local MLS system, and TRREB has been accused of being inflexible when it comes to adapting its MLS rules to accommodate other boards’ needs.

The rules are all “with the intent of ensuring the integrity and security of data,” says Crigger. “But you know, if the system didn’t work and the system wasn’t effective, would we have the volume of active members on a daily basis that we do?

“I think there’s a lot of fear-mongering among some boards,” says Crigger. “They’ve created a false narrative and have been very attacking in their approach. And the reality is, we’ve never worked with them. They have no understanding of what our partnership board approach is.” He says the boards that have partnered with TRREB “have happily continued their relationship for greater than two decades. I’d ask these other boards where they have a 20-year relationship approach with any of their local associations.”

Crigger says that with a partnership, it’s the local boards that have the most to gain. For example, he says OMDREB currently has more than 700 dual members. If they became a partner board with TRREB they would no longer need to be members of TRREB. “So we would likely lose 700 members in the process. But in the interest of efficiency and providing the highest level of value to Realtor colleagues, we’re not concerned about that loss of membership because they are getting better value. They are not paying two sets of fees.”

Crigger says TRREB has no interest in having local boards fold or amalgamate.  “We really see the value in local grassroots representation. I think having boots on the ground for political advocacy, for community engagement is incredibly important. That local touch and local governance is incredibly important.”

He says partnering with TRREB offers local boards “the best of both worlds” because they don’t need to worry about their own MLS system.

“We’re not creating added layers of bureaucracy, additional costs to membership, additional levels of complication. If you look at Durham, I don’t think they function any differently than Oakville, for example. The only difference is that their MLS provider is TRREB, as opposed to a third party.”
He says the board is hoping to roll out some aspects of the new MLS system this fall. The system is described as a “modern, mobile-first new national front-end multi-list platform that merges land registry and MLS data”.  A preview of the system and FAQ section is available here.

Jim Adair

Jim Adair is the Founding Editor of REM Real Estate Magazine. Jim retired in 2022, after 33 years at the helm.

www.remonline.com

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“As president of OMDREB and a member of OMDREB and TRREB since 2005, I will not stand by quietly while you cast doubt and besmirch the great work of the OMDREB volunteer Task Forces, our Board of Directors and our CEO Lorraine McLachlan,” says Hoffmann in a letter to Lisa Patel, TRREB president. “Your communication insinuates we have fallen short on engaging in discussions with you and that TRREB had no role in being responsible for ending the data swap.”

In fact, it was TRREB’s decision, “and it is unfortunate that no reason for the termination of this agreement by TRREB has been provided,” Hoffmann wrote to Patel.

Patel notified members last Friday that the data swap agreement, which has been in place since 2018, would end June 30. In her letter, Patel says, “Following several extensions, the TRREB agreement with the Oakville, Milton and District Real Estate Board (OMDREB) to share listings for properties located within Halton Hills, Milton, and Oakville will end as of June 30, 2021.

“Please note that TRREB submitted a proposal to OMDREB to establish a formal partnership, but we have not heard back since the only discussion on our submission which took place on April 23, 2021,” says the letter from Patel.

OMDREB is currently receiving MLS services from Information Technology Systems Ontario (ITSO), but the agreement expires at the end of this year. The board requested proposals from both TRREB and ITSO to provide MLS data. Both proposals have been received and now volunteer task force committees are studying them. The deadline for a decision on which one will be accepted is the end of August 2021.

Hoffmann says in her letter to Patel, “The data swap and the TRREB Partner Board (MLS services) proposal are two different issues and should not have been conflated as you have done in your communication as it is misleading to members.”

“TRREB’s choice to terminate the data swap, and to, in OMDREB’s view, cause TRREB’s members to infer that OMDREB is to blame for the termination by conflating two unrelated issues will not cause OMDREB to be rushed or pushed to make a faster decision.”

Hoffmann adds, “I would like to point out that OMDREB did not initiate this termination (quite the opposite) and we have worked hard to have TRREB continue the data swap for the benefit of both boards’ members, even if only to such time as we reach our larger MLS decision.”

Hoffmann is also unhappy with REM for its original coverage of the issue. In a separate message to members, she wrote that after the REM story came out, “We have had other media contact us to ask why we ‘ended the data swap’, and were able to provide a clear, accurate and honest response explaining it was not OMDREB that terminated the agreement. The REM article in question is obviously based on the June 25 communication from TRREB to its members, and unfortunately REM did not come to OMDREB for any comment in advance of publication.”

REM editor Jim Adair says Hoffmann is right, and that REM should have contacted OMDREB before publishing the story. “I have spoken to Ms. Hoffmann and apologized for that, and I apologize to OMDREB’s membership,” he says.

Hoffmann says she received a reply from Patel but did not feel comfortable sharing it with REM. TRREB was contacted for a comment but had not replied by REM’s deadline.

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