Holly Parker, a veteran agent who led a top team over a 24-year career at Douglas Elliman, is suing her former brokerage after it demanded $1.6 million in clawbacks.
Parker, who operates in New York and Miami, also alleges she has not been paid her commissions on deals that closed after she left Elliman. Parker joined Compass on Feb. 5.
She had 16 deals under contract at the time she departed, according to the lawsuit. Per an independent contractor agreement Parker signed with Elliman in December 2020, she is entitled to a 40 percent commission split on deals that closed after she left the company, due 30 days after closing.
Ten of those deals closed more than 30 days ago, but the brokerage still hasn’t paid, she alleges in the suit.
“Instead, angered over Parker’s departure, Elliman has not only wrongfully withheld her compensation, but it has insisted that Parker pay it a seven-figure sum based on its contractual clawbacks,” the complaint says.
The independent contractor agreement also included clawbacks for expenses concerning advertising, team payment or car service charges from the 12 months before her departure.
Douglas Elliman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Brokerages use clawbacks to try to prevent agents from leaving. But they can be excessively punitive, agents argue.
And Parker alleges that a series of side letters signed with Elliman superseded her ICA.
One signed in December 2020, for example, granted Parker a 70 percent commission split on her transactions. Another side letter in early 2022 provided up to $205,000 in reimbursement for the costs of having an assistant and receptionist, along with an “override” bonus based on deals procured by an associated agent team.
Per these other agreements, Parker would repay these amounts, plus the bonus provided for in the 2020 side letter, if she left for any reason before Dec. 31, 2024. But Parker left after that date.
In a letter dated Feb. 28, Elliman demanded the $1.6 million in clawbacks. That includes $1.1 million in bonus payments, more than $394,000 in assistant funding, more than $85,000 in advertising spend and $92 in StreetEasy fees.
The brokerage has also withheld nearly $193,000 in commissions that have closed since she left Elliman, according to the complaint.
Elliman is also relying on a document called the policy manual. Parker said Elliman is refusing to provide a copy of the policy manual, except for two different versions of the same excerpt, sent by Elliman on March 4 and April 1.
Elliman refused to provide anything beyond the excerpt “unless she signed a nondisclosure agreement that included a $100,000 liquidated damages provision,” according to the lawsuit.
Parker’s attorney, Michael Rakower of Rakower Law, wrote in the complaint that Elliman’s position is “unsustainable.”
“The limits of its clawback rights are evident in the agreements it signed with Parker,” the lawsuit states. “Elliman is willfully ignoring those limits and wrongfully withholding money owed to Parker as punishment for her departure.”
Parker is seeking damages of about $385,000 (double the commissions withheld) plus attorneys’ fees and other costs. She is also seeking to be released from the clawback demands.
Elliman has lost a number of agents in New York and South Florida in recent months, many to Compass. The departures follow a series of shakeups at Elliman. CEO Michael Liebowitz was appointed in October following longtime CEO and chairman Howard Lorber’s sudden resignation.
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