- A real-estate agent burned down a property while preparing for an open house, a court ruled.
- Her employer was ordered to pay $550,000 in damages to the homeowner and renters.
- The destroyed house in Australia was valued at around $2 million, according to one report.
An Australian real-estate agent accidentally set a multimillion-dollar property on fire while preparing for an open house, according to a recent court judgment.
According to the judgment, the fire at the property in an affluent Sydney suburb started on the afternoon of May 25, 2019.
The court document says that the only person in the property at the time of the fire was Julie Bundock, who was the acting real-estate agent for its sale.
In the judgement, handed down by Judge David Hammerschlag of the New South Wales Supreme Court on Tuesday, Domain Residential North Beaches, Bundock’s employer, was ordered to pay more than AUS$ 850,000 in damages.
This translates to over $550,000 in US money, which will go primarily toward compensating the homeowner Peter Alan Bush for the loss of his house.
A smaller portion is designated for the four renters who had their belongings destroyed in the fire, the judgment said.
The property was valued at an estimated $3 million in Australian currency, or around $2 million in US money, according to News.com.au.
According to the judgment, about 20 minutes before the outbreak of the fire, Bundock had placed laundry, consisting of bedsheets and a quilt cover, onto a steel shelf near a light fixture she had switched on.
Bundock was there to supervise an open house, it said, one of several taking place ahead of a scheduled auction.
The court found that it is likely that the heat generated by the light fitting caused the bedsheets to ignite, initiating the fire.
The homeowner claimed to the court that Bundock had told him soon after the fire started: “Oh my God, Pete, I think I have burnt down your house.”
He said that she confessed to placing some sheets on top of a freestanding metal shelf while tidying up, “right up against the light on the wall,” the judgment said.
According to Bush, Bundock told him: “I think that’s what started the fire.”
In the judgment, Hammerschlag described Bundock as an “aggressive and uncooperative witness,” while determining that “on the balance of probabilities” she caused the fire.
“That a fire might be caused by putting or throwing bedding up against a burning light is obvious,” he said. “That risk was plainly foreseeable, and Bundock ought to have known this.”
Neither Bundock nor Domain Residential responded to Business Insider’s requests for comments, which were sent outside operating hours.
