Reform call back in 1993

ESTATE agents traditionally top the list of despised professions, up there with car dealers, trade union officials and, erm, journalists.

Last month’s Prime Time undercover operation on auctioneers and developers certainly hit the mark with many who’ve felt they got a raw deal from the less professional of the professionals.

The Irish Examiner’s own office relocation move threw up a 1993 (back when the average house price was about £50,000) paper script from Irish and European estate agent Joe McCarthy, then president of the IAVI, calling for licensing, reform and regulation of the estate agency profession in a speech delivered to then Justice Minister Máire Geoghegan Quinn. The points on professional training, bonding, certificates of competence and codes of conduct were made before, and many times since.

Truly, the wheels of justice grind slowly, so Prime Time’s programme title ‘Buyer Beware’ still applies.