rental-property new-zealand
Is it legal for a company to take over management of my property after buying a rent roll without my explicit authority?
<p>My rental property has been managed for a couple of years by company A. I recently found out that management of my property had been sold to company B and that I wasn't informed earlier as it was hard to reach me overseas.</p>

<p>I immediately contacted A and found out that the rent roll with my property on it had been sold by the actual individuals performing the day to day management, rather than the company itself. I presume it was some kind of franchise arrangement that allowed this as opposed to an employee arrangement.</p>

<p>I am now back with A and happy with the new (old) arrangement but for 2 weeks B collected rent and believes that they are entitled to payment for their efforts. From my perspective what B has done, aside from cause undue stress and disruption to my tenants, is act as my agents under false pretenses and intercept rent money without my authority to do so. I have scoured the documents I signed with A to find a section that allows transfer of my authority and it just isn't there. I have also repeatedly asked B to provide the evidence that this is a legal activity but they cannot; they only have vague statements and a history of the same activity to lean on.</p>

<p>B has agreed to what they consider a full refund and what I consider the return of money that was never theirs to begin with so this is purely an academic question: If I have given a rental agency authority to act as landlords over my property, can they transfer that authority to another person or agency without my consent?</p>

<p>If A or its employed had, or represented to B that they had, proper authority to sell their contract with you, then B accepted in go0od faith. In that case B performed work for you, and if it did so to a reasonable professional standard, should be entitled to reasonable compensation, up to whatever your contract with A provided. If BG felol short, that would be a different matter. </p>

<p>If your contract with A did not in fact entitle them to assign or transfer their obligations, you might well have a case against A, but B was entitled to rely on A's representations that this was above board, unless B had actual notice to the contrary, or B had reason to believe otherwise, such that a reasonable person would have been suspicious at least.</p>
