Part of that is probably that most homes in San Francisco are only shown by appointment with the listing agent present, and well, I’d like to think a good listing agent would notice that their client is dead on the sofa before welcoming prospective buyers with the buyer’s agent. No word on whether or not the potential buyers made an offer…
A realtor showed prospective buyers around an £800,000 house while the owner lay dead on her sofa, an inquest heard yesterday. The agent, Samuel Allfort, said he had assumed the 55-year-old woman was sleeping and continued with the pre-arranged viewing.
The Marsh & Parsons employee even left the living room to view last – in case she awoke in time to meet the buyers. But after the viewing he returned to the property as ‘something wasn’t right’, Westminster Coroner’s Court heard. He found the homeowner, Katherine Frame, motionless on the sofa, where she had turned a ‘yellow-ish’ colour, the hearing was told. The incident took place in Notting Hill, West London, on June 29. In a statement read to the court, Mr Allfort said: ‘After finishing the viewing I went outside with the applicants to say goodbye. I then went back into the property because something didn’t seem right.’Upon seeing this person again [she] seemed absolutely motionless and [was] a yellow-ish colour. ‘I called an ambulance, which arrived almost instantly, and the ambulance man soon told me that she had passed away.’
Miss Frame was born in New Orleans, and was living alone since a divorce, the court heard. She had been made redundant a couple of years ago, and this year she decided to sell her house because of financial difficulties and was planning on returning to the U.S. Although Miss Frame had been treated for chronic depression for 23 years and had struggled for years with alcohol problems, a post-mortem revealed that there was no alcohol in her system when she died. However, her liver was severely damaged and pathologist Dr Peter Wilkins told the court this was the ‘most significant’ pathological factor he found. Recording his verdict, Assistant Deputy Coroner Dr Andrew Barton said: ‘I conclude that this was natural causes exacerbated by chronic excessive alcohol ingestion.’
