Disclosure of Representation in Trading Services (DORT)

The Disclosure of Representation in Trading Services (DORT) is a BCFSA-mandated disclosure form a BC real-estate licensee must present to a consumer (buyer or seller) BEFORE providing any substantive trading services — typically before the first showing, before pricing analysis, and certainly before any contract is drafted. The DORT explains the type of agency relationship being established (designated agency), the duties owed by the designated licensee, and the limitations on the relationship (notably: the licensee cannot act for both buyer and seller as dual agent, except in the narrow remote-underserved-market exception).

The trap most BC buyers fall into: treating the DORT as paperwork to be skimmed and signed at the door of the first showing. The form is the legal moment at which the agency relationship is established — including the licensee's fiduciary duties of loyalty, confidentiality, full disclosure, and obedience to lawful instruction. If you sign a DORT establishing client-status with the listing licensee at a showing, you cannot then write through a different licensee on that same listing without going back through a separate DORT. If you sign a DORT establishing client-status with a buyer's licensee, every other licensee you talk to should know — and a competing licensee at an open house cannot start representing you on the spot. The DORT precedes the Buyer's Agency Contract (EBAA, see /glossary/buyers-agency-contract); the DORT is for the relationship, the EBAA is for the contractual scope and commission.