The legendary billionaire CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, Warren Buffett, has found himself at the center of one of the nation’s largest real estate commission lawsuits.
In an amended complaint filed on Monday, the plaintiffs in the Gibson commission lawsuit, which was filed in early November in Missouri by Michael Ketchmark, the attorney for the plaintiffs in the Sitzer/Burnett suit, added Berkshire Hathaway Energy Company to the list of defendants. Buffett’s firm Berkshire Hathaway owns 92% of Berkshire Hathaway Energy Company and real estate firm HomeServices of America is a subsidiary of the company. HomeServices of America is not a defendant in the Gibson suit, however it is a defendant in the Sitzer/Burnett suit and was found liable for colluding with the National Association of Realtors and other real estate industry players to artificially inflate agent commissions.
In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, which first reported the addition of Berkshire Hathaway Energy Company to the Gibson suit, Ketchmark said that the plaintiffs decided to name Buffett’s firm because the issue of collusion goes “all the way to the top of Berkshire Hathaway.”
In the amended complaint, Ketchmark notes that Berkshire Hathaway Energy Company considers HomeServices’ employees as its own, and that the firm could not have expanded or acquired as many real estate firms as it did without the financial backing of Berkshire Hathaway Energy Company.
The complaint…
