Hello, may a real estate agent broker a deal between two non religious Jews in which owner financing (which I am assuming is ribbis) will be used? The agent is getting his fee for the sale, not for the financing agreement. Also would there be any diffrence if one of the jews is using a self owned corparation for the buying?
Answer:
It is permitted to broker the deal, provided that a loan on interest is not an inherent part of the deal.
The fact that the parties will be making a financing agreement between themselves is not the broker’s concern.
This is similar to buying something from a non-observant Jew. Although the seller might use the money for purposes of Shabbos violation, there is no prohibition of making the purchase.
If corporations are used, the matter is somewhat more lenient, because some authorities rule that prohibitions of ribis are not applicable to corporations (please see our article here for details).
Despite this, if the Jew is a majority shareholder in the corporation, it will be hard to permit making the deal where the financing agreement is an inherent part of the agreement.
