What recourse is there for this agent now that the paper trail is dead?

An interesting situation

I received a call the other day from a former agent of mine (now a Broker of her own shop) with an interesting situation that she thought I could shed some light on. I’m always eager to talk with a fellow professional and I’m particularly excited to help someone for whom I was once their Designated Broker.

The circumstances to her problem stemmed around a recent sale where she represented the Buyer. The conversation took a turn when she told me the new homeowner tried to turn on their furnace during a recent cool evening here in Seattle (seems we are getting our share of those lately).

Oopsy #1

The problem occurred when the furnace that was (presumably) working fine before these new homeowners bought the house, now seemed to be on the fritz! My former agent told me they asked to have the furnace serviced as part of the inspection response (let me preface by saying that inspections are not a pass/fail thing here in Washington) but never received any invoice or receipt from whoever serviced the furnace (oopsy #1).

Oopsy #2

I asked her if she knew who had performed the service by contacting the seller but it appears the seller is nowhere to be found (oopsy #2). Aside from the relaxed nature of the furnace service on the buyer’s side, our inspection contingency forms clearly state that all repairs agreed to by the seller are to be performed in a “Commercially reasonable manner.”

Help- what recourse is there?

So my submission to you all is this… although there appears to be no “paper trail” the furnace was serviced, if in fact it was serviced at all, and the inspector appeared to give the furnace a “thumbs up” during the inspection, what recourse does the new homeowners have if they want to pursue remedy for the cost of a new furnace?

Your comments are encouraged and any similar situation that can help is also highly sought. Oh, and please, no one beat up my former agent…she feels bad enough as it is!