Well they must be doing something to get their money back, plus profit. If this isn't it, what do you t hink it is?
If they've been in business 10 years, as some one says, it seems likely someone has sold his house by now, but otoh, these things start out small. Maybe they only got 5 customers the first 5 years and they haven't sold yet. (That leaves the next 5 years.)
I too wondered about your use of "shrewd". Is this a Canadian difference? Because to me, to be shrewd, they'd have to make money without antagonizing people (at least until after they've milked all the first guy's friends.)
There were about 30 real estate companies listed for the next zip code over (I'm not putting in my own zipcode! but it didnt' matter because the ones they showed covered the whole city and all the suburbs. I guess they go by the first 3 numberss)
But I don't doubt that if I called them, all 30 would say they'r e not involved. But no one has to be involved now because my house, for example, is not for sale yet. But if I had signed up for this and want ed to sell, I'll bet they have a real estate company too scrungy to list that would take the job. Either that, or they let me sell it with another company and come after me then for the commission I should have paid them. (I didn't see it but the Albuquerque tv station report on this said that their website (and another source) said that even if people don't use the right real estate company, they still owe a percentage of the sale price.
I don't know how they do this, but they're not going to all this trouble for nothing. (Also their contract says they have 16 months to deliver the first gift card, so maybe in most cases they don't even give t he gift card. All that means is that when they collect their commission, the percentage of the sale price, they'll have to pay out the gift card amount plus interest since the cards were due. BUT I GUARANTEE IT that they will take in a l ot more money than they have to pay out, after the law suit.
I also don't know how they keep an eye on their suckers. How do they know when the house goes on the market, or when it's sold. Maybe they only do business in places where this info is easy to get. In Baltimore County and all of Maryland, all the real estate transactions are online and can be read from home, for free. Maybe someone wrote a program that checks the house sales in each county and compares each new entry in the online list with the scammer's own list of customers. I guess that wouldn't be hard to write, even for me, if standard files were used. If I knew more about writing for home computers, it would probably be no harder.
If they wait until after the sale is made, and sue then, there is no need for any real estate agent at all.