An Adelaide Magistrate has found a suburban real estate agent not guilty of breaching the Land and Business (Sale and Conveyancing) Act.

The Commissioner for Consumer Affairs had alleged Cocks Auld Real Estate had marketed residential land in The Advertiser and local Messenger newspapers below the prescribed minmum advertising price by advertising the land for $550,000 when the vendor’s acceptable price for the sale of the land was $600,000.

Magistrate Paul Bennett found that the documentary evidence did not establish beyond reasonable doubt that the vendor had agreed to an amended selling price of $600,000 before the advertisements were placed. Mr Bennett ordered the Commissioner to pay the defendant’s costs.