New NAR Rules are Officially in Effect

This is episode number 394 of The Homeowner Show. Whether you're DIY or looking to hire, we're here to help you find the best information and options for you and your home. My name is Kevin Hackett. Here with me is Craig Williams.

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome to The Homeowner Show. We're so glad that you can join us for another live episode. Here in the studio. How you doing, Kev?

And I'm pretty good. Yeah, I drove over here and I don't know if you saw, you were at my house just before you— we started at some point because that's how we roll. Yes, how we roll. Did you see the moon on your way home?

I have not seen the moon.

It is large.

Although it does— that makes me want to sing the Kyland song. Well, I'm telling those of you that have children my age, you know exactly what I'm talking about. Yes, you do.

The moon is quite large tonight.

The moon?

Yes.

The moon?

The moon.

Shine down on me?

Yes, that one. And it was awesome. It's gorgeous.

Yeah? Is it full moon?

Well, yes.

Okay.

But, but it— I mean, like, it's some sort of special moon. It's not a blood moon. It's not— it's some special moon.

Just old regular moon.

Massive.

Yeah, big old ball of cheese.

Yeah. And, and driving down 105 here There's no clouds, there's nothing, and it's just like right there.

Yeah, it's perfect. You know what surprises me about the moon?

Tell me.

How many people believe that we've never been there.

That's— it's just laughable. It's just laughable.

I really like— surprise— like, and I've listened to the arguments, I get it.

Sure.

I don't, I don't agree. No. Like, like, look, I, I grew up around astronauts.

Yes.

In Florida.

Yes.

Like, I have no doubt that we've been to the moon.

Right.

I'm just like, well, I'm actually curious in like the comments section, like how many people actually like follow. And I don't—

Tell us, please.

I don't judge. Like, I'm genuinely curious how many people think that we've never been to the moon because I, it's like, I think it's as surprising as flat earthers.

Oh, I think they're the same people.

You think the same people? Yeah, I don't know. I wonder if they think the moon's flat.

Oh, that's a really good question.

And is the moon real, or is it just— I think they think it's real. I'm just, I'm curious if they think that it's flat.

And, and if it is flat, it would have to be vertical instead of horizontal. We're on a horizontal Earth. I guess they would think it's on a vertical Right? Because how would you look at it and see it ever?

Ever? Well, and like, what's covering it when it's not fully exposed? A flat sun?

An invisible cloak? I do— I don't know.

Hand puppetry?

I don't know. I don't know.

I'd be interested to hear, right? Maybe they've thought about it more than I have, right?

Well, I would hope so.

I would hope that they've thought about that more than you have. I would— if not, I really want to ask them now.

Yeah, I do too. Well, you know what? We'll have them on the show.

Well, no, we'll have them on the show.

This will be great.

Well, okay, look, okay, here's the deal. We're doing a live episode tomorrow night. We are from Moonshine Deck.

Yeah, Moonshine.

From Moonshine Deck.

Perfect.

So if you are a flat earther and feel like you have a good answer to the question, Is the moon round, right? Or I guess globular. What's the— or there's a, there's a word for spherical. Yeah, it's a sphere. Uh, if, if you, if you have a good answer to my question, do you think the moon is flat?

Yes.

Because I think it would logically follow that if you think that the Earth is flat, that the moon would be flat, or, or other planets.

Or as well, or other planets, right?

Maybe the sun is just a giant dime.

Well, but it's not a planet, it's a star. So they could theoretically think that that was— that one's round. Okay. They could.

They could.

Because they may say, well, it's just gas. It's just a—

I don't know. I don't know what they think.

I don't either. But we could literally find out at Moonshine Deck. I need you to come after 7:30. Well, just, just so everybody knows, we're going to be live at Moonshine Deck in Conroe tomorrow.

Right.

And we'd love for everybody to come out and say, hey, we're going to be interviewing some contractors and the like, right? And we're going to start sometime around 6.

Yeah, I think last time we had like 200-some-odd people show up.

A lot of people. And if you remember, it might have rained that night a little bit. A little bit.

We got done, like, we wrapped it like—

well, it's the fastest we've ever torn down.

We were like old men that had been struck by lightning in a previous life because we knew Exactly when to wrap that booger up.

Yes, we did.

It's like soon as we finished packing it, the bottom dropped out.

It sure did.

And we stayed for another hour and a half, probably because we couldn't get out.

Couldn't leave. Was the like the that will not happen tomorrow.

The roof had been penetrated at the building. It was it was not safe.

It was not.

So unfortunately, we had to stay and have another drink.

That's right. But here's the thing. Just I mean, I feel like I'm a decent arguer, debater, sure person who can create. conversation. But when it comes to debate, I— you will beat me.

Who's you?

You, Craig.

Oh, me. Okay.

You're better at it than I am.

I like to argue.

Well, you're— yes, but debate and arguing, I do believe, are slightly different. Um, I'm pretty quick on my feet.

But I like to undersell myself. That way there's low expectations.

Yeah, well, and 2 Bourbon Craig might be better at that point. I just think you need to be there at 7:30 so both of us can have this conversation.

Okay, that's fair.

Just because you're gonna be a little late. Uh-huh, I am.

It's fine.

I'm a little truant. Yeah, it's fine. Right, but write me up, I don't care. No, it'll be fine. But you know who will be there?

Who will be there?

Lone Star Appliance Repair.

Ooh.

They will be there.

Sarah's actually bringing the guests to us. They are, they are literally hosting the entire show all night.

That's right.

Yeah.

You want to talk about them? Of course.

Do it. They're my one of my favorite sponsors.

Mm-hmm. They are our longest.

That's right. They are our longest sponsor. These listen guys, you guys have heard us yammer on and on and on about this.

Although I put True Texas Solar up, so I'm going to take them down.

Take them down.

Put a load start.

Thank you. I appreciate that. Now let's talk. Okay. Now let's talk about it. Let's give credit where credit is due.

That's right. Whoops.

So, no. Anyway, guys, Lone Star Appliance Repair is a, is a local appliance repair company that can service pretty much all of the appliances in your home. I think the only one they don't work on is the water heater.

Oh, yeah.

So, like, look, if you, if you have one, and the reason they don't work on those is because they leave that to the plumbers. That's their specialty. You really need a plumber to work on those. And so they're upfront and honest about that.

Yeah.

So, but like any other appliance in your home, if you're having a problem with it, it's acting a little wonky, it's getting a little saucy with you, A little saucy. A little saucy. Give them a call because they can probably get it fixed. And one of the, one of the cool things about Lone Star Appliance Repair, it's not that they can get it fixed. One of the things that you hear from a lot of appliance companies is like, look, it's going to be 3 weeks for us to get the part.

Right.

They actually have a storehouse of parts that they keep on hand that are the most replaced parts on appliances.

There you go.

They've done the research. They looked at it and said like, look, these are the ones that we're replacing all the time. Let's just buy a bunch of them and keep them on hand. That way we can get our customers taken care of. Faster.

I wanna know what those are just so I can make sure I don't buy those brands.

Right. They probably don't wanna release that because they don't wanna get into legal trouble with any of the companies that they're servicing.

But I'm gonna talk to Sarah.

But I'm gonna ask some questions.

That's right.

So, and she'll probably tell you.

Probably.

But anyway, guys, give them a call because as we've discussed before, it's almost always cheaper to fix an older appliance than it is to go use your credit Right. To buy a new one.

Right.

So give them a call. Kevin, what's the number?

The number is 936-647-2364.

Right.

That's it.

Give them a call.

Give them a call. And our another sponsor— our another—

Our another—

Our another sponsor.

Thanks, GW.

That's right. It is True Texas Solar. And these guys, uh, look, we, we talked about them so many times. We've, we've They've sponsored our show. Like, we've gone and done live events with them as well.

I think we have another one coming up in September.

September.

I think so.

Is it a home show?

It is a home show.

Okay.

Yeah. Yeah.

So Josh and those guys over there, they're phenomenal, and they're now True Texas Solar and Roofing.

And Roofing. Yeah.

And so if you're curious, hey, what does it look like to have solar on my, on my house?

Right.

And what if my roof, you know, is it in good enough shape? They can take care of all of those questions. They can help you get a new roof if you need to. They can repair your roof if they need repairs, and they can put solar on your house. And oh, by the way, if something ever did happen to your solar panels and you had to do a warranty on it, and then there were maybe things that need to be done on the roof, they can just do all of it.

You don't have to— I think that's, I think that's the biggest value, the add value, is like you now have a company that can do the whole thing.

That's right.

You're not having to like go back and forth between 2 companies and go like, okay, can you fix the roof? Okay, can you fix the solar? Okay, now can you fix the roof?

Can you put the solar back? Like, that, that seems like a nightmare. It really does. And, and whenever you've got an issue with your roof specifically, I don't want some, like, I'll be there in a week. Right. I need it taken care of.

And if there's anything we know about this company, it's not like they're willy-nilly going like, hey, guess what? We're gonna do roofs now. No. It's like, no, they're gonna get the best experts. That's right. On staff. And, and the crews that can manage, they, they already have them. We know that they do.

They do.

I mean, like, when we met this crew, we were just like, alone.

I couldn't believe it was like the all-star cast.

I know. It's like guys from NASA and, like, meteorologists and, like, all these guys that are, like, consulting on your solar project.

That's right. And, and look, Josh is incredibly knowledgeable, and he knows what he's talking about.

Yep.

But I'll tell you, the smartest people in the world surround themselves with the smartest people in the world.

Yeah.

And, and he's, he's gone over and above to make sure that his company is truly the best in the business. And, man, if you need solar, if you want solar, if you want to talk about solar, if you have inquiries about whether or not it would work in your scenario, whatever the case is, give them a call, 936-286-8325.

Awesome. Tonight's show, guys, if you didn't read the title, we're going to be getting into this whole NAR thing. Which stands for National Association of Realtors.

That's right.

It had a different name. I think it was started back in like 1905 in Chicago. It had like a whole different vibe back then. But anyway, it's still based out of Chicago. They actually just had a very unfortunate news article, or at least really poorly titled.

That seems to happen a lot.

Like right after everything that happened with this. See if I can pull it up.

Yeah, I, I'll— I, I can't help you right now.

I know, I know, I know, I know.

Yeah.

Uh, any— anyway, it was— come on, where is it? There it is. Uh, I, and I, I hope I pronounce this right. Uh, Nikia Wright named permanent CEO for National Association of Realtors. That was today.

Oh, so today? Today.

So she's been like the interim CEO through all of this nonsense.

So they haven't had a CEO the entire time that they've been making one of the largest, most consequential things?

Like, uh, well, at least according— like, look, as much, as much noise and hullabaloo is coming from real estate agents on this, you'd think like that they just ruined the entire industry.

Well, yeah, and maybe they did.

I don't think that they did, but—

But we don't know.

We don't know. Well, yeah, well, time will tell. I think, you know, regardless of what happens with this group, I don't think it's going to change the need for people to have good representation to buy a home.

Well, that's, that's the thing is it's— I think so often we get hung up, and I get it if you're a realtor. If you're a realtor, this can be a big issue. But as a, as a buyer or a seller, you're gonna have to look past the issue and go, look, I still need the best person out here. And I will tell you this. There are people bailing on the real estate agent market.

Uh-huh.

Whatever that means.

Are you talking about, like, the profession? Yes.

Okay. People are leaving because they're like, I don't wanna deal with this. And so the people that are pushing through going, look, we'll figure it out. It's not that big of a deal.

Right.

It's still my job. I'm still really good at it. Go after those people and use those people because they're the ones that are going to help.

Yeah, so I mean, just, just some, some quick stats. I mean, everything went into implementation this past Saturday. Yeah, so which is why we're talking about it now, because I mean, like, everybody's been talking about it up until this point, and there's been a lot of people out there like, look, get your deals in now before the 17th because then you got to start following all these new rules. And I mean, like, honestly, like, some of the new rules are just not They're not that big of a deal.

Okay, let's talk about them.

Um, well, before we do that, I wanna, I wanna get into a little bit of like what happened.

Okay.

Um, so what happened with all of this is a group brought a suit, um, against the NAR. Okay, base— it was a class action suit, um, that had to do with buyer broker commission structures.

Okay.

Um, and it was— buyers were basically coming in and saying, like, it wasn't clear to us how we were— how our, our representations commissions were being paid.

From the buyer side?

From the buyer side.

Okay.

Um, so basically, in, uh, in, in March of this year, NAR agreed to pay a settlement of $418 million to that class action suit.

Ouch.

But also wanted to make it very, very clear that they deny any wrongdoing.

Well, of course. How could they have done anything wrong?

I, I don't know. I'd need to go through and read everything from that case in order to make, like, a good opinion on that.

Right.

I don't know that they did anything wrong.

Maybe not.

Maybe they didn't. Maybe they did. I don't know. Because, like, I wasn't the judge in that case. I didn't, I didn't sit and listen to all the evidence. I don't know.

Yeah.

And, but all of these changes that are, that came into effect as of this past Saturday were a result of the agreement in the settlement. And so the people that brought the class action suit were like, look, not only do we want the money, but we want changes made so that this doesn't happen to people again in the future.

Yeah.

And so the NAR made concessions, which that word will come up a lot tonight, um, to the settlement that we would make changes to our organization so that this wouldn't happen again. So, which, that should raise all kinds of questions in people's minds.

Sure.

Right? Because the NAR is essentially acting as a governing board, right, for all real estate agents across the nation, across the nation, that and this is, this is an interesting bit, that want to consider themselves a realtor because they have the name realtor trademarked. So you cannot call yourself a realtor unless you are a member of the NAR.

Interesting.

Yeah. And so, like, they have that.

That— well, that's, that's not nothing.

That's not nothing.

No.

And, and so what, what makes it weird for me is, like, nobody— this isn't a government agency.

Mm-hmm.

This— what a lot of people have described it as, it's almost like a chamber of commerce.

Yeah.

But for the whole country.

Yeah. Like a, like a school board, even like some sort of a board of directors.

But like even a school board has some sort of like association with local government.

Yeah.

And so like, I'm like trying to like figure out like, what is this squiggly snake that I've got my hands on now and what does it actually do?

Yeah, because the— it's one of those deals where you, you can't go outside of what they're doing without— and, and use their terminology, right, without repercussions.

Well, the— okay, so the other thing that's important to understand, while you cannot call yourself a realtor without being a member of the NAR, the NAR also controls access to the MLS.

Right. Now that's— and that, that is massive. Yes. So do they own, do they own like the MLS structure and the whole, the whole kit and caboodle with that? Because there— so the MLS is a massive thing and, and there's lots of different ways that it implements itself. Um, an individual realtor can have MLS on their website. Uh, we've got, you've got, um, organizations like HAR down here Cucamonga Realtors, that, it's its own MLS-type system. You know, you've got Zillow and all these places that they're kind of— Redfin— that are kind of their own MLS system.

But most of those are pulling from the MLS.

It's all pulling from the MLS.

Right. So, okay. So here's— I'm gonna read the answer to you.

Okay.

It says the National Association of Realtors governs many local Multiple Listing Services, MLS.

Yeah.

That real estate brokers use to exchange information across the country. However, many MLSs are independent of NAR, and membership is often restricted to licensed brokers and their agents. For example, MLS/PIN is one of the larger independent MLSs in North America. MLSs are created, maintained, and paid for by real estate professionals. They are based on the idea that help me sell my inventory and I'll help you sell yours. MLSs help competitors cooperate by allowing them to find cooperative brokers, level the playing field, and access the largest pool of properties for sale. MLSs benefit both buyers and sellers. Buyers can get information about all MLS-listed properties while working with only one broker. Sellers benefit from increased exposure to their property. And here's another thing. This is

a question on another— this is from reso.org. It's Real Estate Standards Organization. And it's a FAQ. Who owns the MLS? Most MLSs are owned by the Realtor Association that formed them. Realtor has a little trademark R next to it. How do you get to be called a Realtor? You got to be part of the NAR. They may be—

my question is this: what a right! That sounds so convoluted.

A lot of this is. A lot of this is. And I think intentionally so. Sure.

I, I'm sure the NAR needs it to be convoluted. But I'll tell you this, they got a lot of money floating around if they can pay out $418 million.

That was the settlement.

That's the settlement that they got.

That wasn't— they were— what they were looking at had they lost the case.

Right. And not only that, all the fees and all the— their lawyers and all the things that went into this entire scenario.

Mhmm.

They got a lot of money being paid to them by all these realtors and these brokers and these MLS associations saying, hey, can I borrow your stuff? Mhmm. They— yeah, I think you're right. They, they got a hold on, on you.

Yeah.

And I would really be interested to hear from, from Christy or from Brandy or some of our realtor friends who, who might be—

Freddie's a big voice in this.

Yeah, Freddie, uh, he knows a lot too. We got a lot of realtor friends, y'all.

I wonder why.

Yeah, right. To learn a little bit more about that partnership, because that, to me, that sounds just wackadoodle.

Right, right, right. So I mean, like, here's, here's the, the big things that I've, I've been— sorry, go ahead.

I want to— I got one more thing.

Uh-huh.

Let's talk about what traditionally has been the buyer-seller compensation situation.

Okay, so what has traditionally happened is it's been a 6%, uh, commission.

Yes, and it's typically between 5 and 6, but, um, my realtor that I've used recently a couple times, uh, Brandy, love her. She will tell you straight up, I won't work for less than 3%, right? I just won't. It's— she said, I've spent too much, it's too much work, right, for me to work for less than 3%. Which means she gets 3% as the buyer or the seller agent, and the opposite person in the transaction, their agent would get 3%, right? Okay.

Yeah, that's what it's traditionally been.

Traditional.

But that's always been negotiable.

It has been.

Um, but it's, it's always just sort of been understood.

Yes, very much understood. And not only that, I didn't realize this until I, I bought my first house, um, that it is trad— it is very traditional for the seller to pay all 6% of this. Now that, that was not known to me whenever I bought my first house. Yeah, it made— when as a buyer, I loved it. But as a seller, I didn't love it.

Well, I mean, I mean, if you're the buyer, you're paying it anyway.

Well, yeah, you are. You're paying for it.

You're paying for all of it.

But what you are— but that, that's definitely coming out of what the buyer is getting.

It's— well, it's— I mean, it's what the seller's getting.

What the seller is getting.

It's coming out of their, their end they're in total.

Right.

But the buyer's paying for it. Sure. It's just not— that's—

it doesn't feel like you're paying for it.

No. It doesn't feel like you're paying for it.

But that— but you see what I'm saying? Like, to, to me as a buyer, I went, oh, great. I don't have to pay. I don't have to pay my agent. Right. Like, the seller has to pay the agent. But we're agreeing on a price.

But this is— this is something that I think sellers need to be very, very clear on is, like, when you negotiate a price, a lot of times sellers don't realize that they're not getting that total. No, they're not. Because I think, I think in a lot of sellers' minds is, okay, I'm going to sell my— and let's just, let's just keep this simple— I'm going to sell my home for $200,000.

Yep.

And then somebody who's really nice is going to come along and add a 6%, which is $12,000, on top of that. That's $12,000 that the buyer is then going to pay. $212,000 for this house. And that's not the way it works.

No, it's not.

It's the other way around. You agreed to sell that house for $200,000, and then you're gonna have to take 6% out of what you're taking home.

So now it's $188,000. Right. Yep.

To— then that's what, that's what you get.

That's right.

And then you have to pay off your loan.

Yep.

And everything else that goes along with that, and any other concessions that you made.

And you should say, in taxes, if you're not turning around and putting that back into another home, right, then you got to pay taxes on top of that, which, which is a significant— I think it's like 20%. Right.

It's massive.

Yeah. If you're not putting that back into real estate. Yeah.

Or doing, like, a 1031 or something like that.

Right.

I mean, which essentially is putting it into another property.

Sure.

But, but anyway, it's— this, this is something that's just a misconception. And I think something that needs to be discussed with, like, first-time homebuyers.

Mhmm. Mhmm.

You know, first-time home sellers.

Mhmm.

But I don't— this is, this is why I think it's important to get a good real estate agent.

Oh, absolutely.

Someone that's going to be clear and upfront with you. And I think that's what a lot of this is trying to do.

Yes.

Theoretically. Force agents to be more clear and to be more concise in their communications and in their official documentation. And like, look, I get it, there is stupid amount of paperwork that already goes into buying a home.

There is.

All right, like, and, and, and if you've done this a couple times and you have like an agent that you've worked with a couple times, you kind of get the feel of it because your agent will come in like, look, it's time, just, you know, Stretch your hand, you know, make sure your pen hand is ready to go because we're gonna be signing a lot of stuff and you're gonna be reading very little of it.

That's it.

Um, and, and, and, and they, they are required to know what's on every single page of it, and that if you ask a question, they are required to explain it to you, right? So like, they're not trying to like hurry you up.

It's just a lot. There's like 200 pages.

It's ridiculous. And so now there's more.

Yes, now there's more, but Here's, here's what's interesting is you're probably gonna sign it on the back end.

Mhmm.

Also gonna sign it on the front end. You're gonna— I mean, before— because here's what it turns out to be. Before you even, like, I, I'm, I'm just gonna assume that if I were to go to Brandy right now and say, hey, I'm looking to buy a house.

Right.

She would probably say, alright. Here's a piece of paper.

Mhmm.

How much are you gonna pay me?

Right.

before she'll even talk to me.

Yep.

Because she has to ensure that she's going to get paid. So let's talk about what the new rules are, because I think we're getting a little hairy.

I mean, like, I don't— I mean, I can't really get into, like, like, what they are specifically because I don't know them.

Well, it's—

here's what I can— here's what I can tell you.

Okay.

Is number one, there's got to be a clear buyer agreement in place before you can even show a potential client a home.

Yes.

So that's, that's, that's the new one that, that a lot of people are bitching about.

That's why I'm saying you're— yes, before you even— before Brandy's gonna have another conversation with you, your real estate agent— I'm using Brandy just because I love her, right? Um, before Brandy's gonna talk to you, unfortunately, she's gonna have to put a piece of paper in front of you. You're gonna have to sign it. How much are you going to pay me? It can be a dollar amount, it can be a percentage, it can be a— well, there's something else it can be, but there's like 3 things. It can be a dollar, a percentage, or, uh, something else. But there— but you have to sign it, right?

Yeah, and it has— yeah, and it has to be clear as to what that agent is going to be paid should they close a property. That's right.

And you, the buyer, are paying that.

Yes.

And that— and here's the thing, and this is, this is probably where it becomes way more difficult to buy a house now. And here's why I think that. Because as a seller, you don't have to come to the table with money, right? You're, you're getting the money, and what you're getting paid, you're losing money on the front end, right? I don't, I don't have to go pony up and say, here's that $12,000 that I owed you. No, you're just going to get $12,000 less than what you sold the house for, right? As a buyer though, you're paying— let's say you're paying that full $200,000 for the house. Now on top of that, you have to

come up with 3%, whatever your agreement is, whatever you agreed to. Now you got to come up with more money other than your down payment, right?

Right.

Which— so now you're doubling down on money you got to come up with.

Yep.

I— and this is why, and I've, I've read this, um, this is why this is probably going to affect first-time home buyers the most.

Big time.

Because they do—

there's already— Most of them are cash poor.

That's right. They're trying to come up with a down payment to begin with. And, and for— and even, even first-time home buyer incentives, and I'm sure this is all gonna change with new incentives that are going to come out, Even new incentives are typically requiring at least 3% down.

Mm-hmm.

And 3% on $200,000 is still a chunk of money if you don't have any money in your pocket because you just sold something.

Right.

Right? So now you got to come up with 3% for the down payment and 3% for, uh, for the commission. Now you're back up to $12,000 that you got to come up with instead of $6,000.

Right.

It's a big— it's a big lump money.

It's a big difference. Well, and like even more so if you're looking to avoid— avoid— avoid, uh, PMI. That's—

well, you got to get to 20% at that point.

You're talking about 23%. 23%, you know, at, at the most.

Well, yes, but still, I mean—

well, I mean, not necessarily, because that's the whole thing is commissions are now negotiable. Yeah.

Yeah. So, so the other side of this is, from, from what I understand, correct me where I'm wrong, Craig, is the seller can all— is also going to have to do this. They're also going to have to tell their, their real estate agent how much they're going to pay them.

Mm-hmm.

And they can incentivize the buyer by paying some of the, some of the buyer's agent as well. So for example, I don't—

I don't think— I think, I think that's actually something that's going away.

So here, here's what I think is happening. You again correct me if I'm wrong, but what I read said that so originally they would pay 3% plus their 3% plus 3% of the buyer, right? Now theoretically, they only have to pay 3% to their seller.

Okay.

If they want to though, they can choose to pay 4%, 5%, or 6% to pay, to pay the buyer's portion.

I think that's the way it was in the past. I, I think that's the way it was in the past.

I think they can still do that though.

Well, I think they, I think they can, but it has to be part of the negotiation and It has to be part of the listing.

It's got to be part of the negotiation and part of the listing. I agree. They can— and, and here's what's crazy— they can, they can now inform the buyer what that amount's going to be, um, personally, which means they're going to get their personal information somehow, or through an email, or through their agent, or there's a couple different ways.

But yeah, they've—

that buyer's already agreed to pay the realtor something. So it's possible that the buyer, the buyer agent on this walks away with 6%.

Oh, okay.

And the seller only walks away with 3%.

I got you.

There is the possibility that that can happen based on what I read.

Yeah, I see what you're saying. Yeah, that— I mean, one of the, one of the things that I read is they're trying Part of this settlement was that they were trying to get rid of baiting on MLS listings by sellers by, by saying how much, like, you know, luring them in with, uh, broker fees, right? Um, or broker, broker's commissions.

Everything's commissions.

Um, and so, uh, so they're, they're looking to get rid of that by having the buyer have a prior agreement before even viewing an open house or a listing, right? And so that way that's in place, so they can't set— they then— they can't then say that the listing agent lured the buyer's agent.

Yes.

You know what I'm saying?

Yes.

So that's all this stuff that they're trying— that they're trying to end around, okay? And so one of the things is— so it's supposed to be a disclosure of all commissions on MLS listings, and so that's supposed to be up front.

Right.

Um, but also buyers to sellers that commissions are negotiable.

Right.

That also has to be put on the listing now. And, and so apparently there's been a lot of— what's the best way to put this? Um, AI-generated listings, uh, that they're now having to go through and correct.

Interesting.

Um, you know what, you know, like copying and pasting basically. Like, you know, hey, this is— I've been using this template for years and years and years.

Right.

And so now I'm gonna have to go through and edit all of this stuff and put in the legalese that the NAR is telling me I have to use. So, and that's the other thing, is the NAR is putting the squeeze on all of the brokers by saying, like, look, you agreed to comply to our list of morals and ethics in order to be an NAR member.

Right.

And so if you want to continue to be called a realtor, you are going to have to comply with the way in which we want you to list houses. Which again, it's like, yes, Mommy. Who are you?

Yes, Daddy.

Wow. That's, that's the weird part to me. It's like we essentially, we have a governing body.

That's right.

That's not part of the government.

No. And the government therefore cannot control. Yes.

Which is kind of cool.

Well, it is, except that it is a monopoly in that way. Yeah. And, and, and they can do whatever they want to, which is why I think that we've got this issue, right, where this class action suit came in and they're like, no, no, you had way too much control. You abused it. You took control. You took advantage of us. We, we don't have any say in how this is being done anymore. So let's change the rules up. And that's, that's where we're at right now. Now, what is interesting And I may be jumping the gun. If I am, that's okay. We can, we can back up. But what's interesting is that we're, we're dealing with this in Texas, right?

But this practice has been going on in other states for a while.

Yes.

So this, this is not necessarily outside of what the NRA has said is possible. It's just not been mandated, and now it's being mandated.

Yeah. So like you have states like Colorado, Washington, California that has been— have been doing this kind of stuff for a long time.

Yeah.

And so, and that's the thing is like each state gets to set their own rules, right? It's just funny how a lot of those rules seem to comply with what the NAR says the rules ought to be.

Oh, it— so this NAR is interesting. NAR is in Chicago, right?

Well, it's—

The governing or its governing body, whatever that is.

Well, yeah, it's headquartered in Chicago.

Okay. But is Chicago one of those states?

You mean Illinois?

Yeah, that's what I meant.

I don't know off the top of my head. That would be an interesting— I don't know.

Your own state doesn't agree with the way you're doing it.

I'm looking it up.

So, but so So this whole deal is, I, I, again, what's, what's happening, and I, I think we need to be clear about this, what's happening is realtors are doing their best to advocate for themselves. They're doing their best to go, look, I, I'm performing a massive service for you. And for those of you that don't really know what your realtor does, just ask them. And I'll tell you what you're gonna find.

Mm-hmm.

Is, is you're gonna stop them halfway through thinking they're about done, but they're halfway through, right? And go, I didn't know you did that much. And they're like, oh, I'm, I'm just halfway there. Like, there's so much that they do and so much you don't have to do that that amount of money that you're paying them is worth every penny. But they feel over— they feel regulated to a place that they, they don't have anywhere to move. So theoretically, this is better for the realtors. Theoretically. Um, the class action suit was to get more aligned with what realtors want.

Just more transparency is what you're trying to get.

More transparency. But the problem is when that sort of thing happens, it's often the person that's actually buying or selling that gets shafted.

It is.

And I think that's one, especially for first-time homebuyers, that's what we're looking at. We're looking at opportunities that they are gonna lose, or it's gonna, it's gonna be counterproductive to what some of— I, okay, we, we try not to get too, too, too deep in the political situation here, right? But one of the things that is always on a platform is first-time homebuyers in homes, right?

Right.

Like, get more people into homes. This is gonna— this is gonna cause a problem with that, right? Because it's just not gonna be as easy.

So on, on their own site, it's— these are NAR settlement FAQs.

Okay.

They have like a whole section of the website dedicated to this.

All right, here we go.

Okay, so number 4: by changing the cooperative compensation policy, aren't you admitting that it was problematic? That's the question.

Yeah, it's a good question.

All right. Here's what they say. No.

Of course not.

The settlement makes clear that NAR continues to deny any wrongdoing in connection with the MLS Cooperative Compensation Model Rule. NAR has long maintained and will continue to believe that cooperative compensation and NAR's current policies are good things that benefit buyers and sellers. They promote access to real property ownership, particularly for lower and middle income buyers who can have a difficult enough time saving for a down payment. Real estate laws in many states authorize off— authorize offers of compensation. With this settlement, NAR is confident it and its members can still achieve all those goals. Okay, so here's the other thing. What— so this is the follow-up question to number 4. Number 5.

Okay.

What were the key factors that influenced NAR's decision to choose the legal path it did for the settlement? So why did you do this?

Why did you do it?

Okay. NAR explored settling throughout the litigation and carefully considered all legal options. These included appealing. A win on appeal would only have addressed the verdict in the Sizer-Burnett case, not, not any of the copycat cases, and may only have resulted in new jury trial, leaving members and consumers with continued uncertainty. Chapter 11 reorganization. Bankruptcy, my friends. Mm-hmm. In theory, Chapter 11 would have enabled NAR to eliminate its own liabilities while pursuing an appeal to the Sizer-Burnett verdict. But we believe that would have left members with continued uncertainty and potential liability risk.

So what they're saying here— and I'm interrupting you, I'm sorry. What they're saying here is, you're welcome.

Well, no. Yeah. I mean, to a certain degree, you're welcome.

If we would have done that, we could have declared bankruptcy. Yeah. Everybody could have been screwed. And you wouldn't have wanted that.

No, it was— if we didn't, we would have been sued more.

More.

And if that happened, then we would have been bankrupt, right? And you all would have been up you-know-what creek.

That's right.

And where would you be then?

Good luck.

And so it's like, yeah.

And, and they're probably not wrong.

They're probably not wrong. But at the same time, like, this, this is like Obama language, man.

It's—

yeah, they're too big to fail. Uh-huh. And like, we can't, we can't have stuff like that.

No. Like, that's— and again, it comes down to this monopoly thing to where They've yeah, they've got a hold on us.

Yeah. And so that's that's really why not on us on on on on the agents.

Yeah, on the agents. Well, and that's really one of the reasons I'd really like to get you know it'd be fun to have like two or three of them in here just to just to hear.

We need a cool down period.

We do we do because they're still drinking. But we we we need to I I really want to hear what. what their thought on this is. And, and here's what I'd be really interested in. I'd be really interested in those 3 people that we talked about earlier.

Yeah.

If they were all in here, if they would all go, you know what, we're gonna figure it out and it'll be fine.

No, and I think, I think that's going to be the attitude of all of them at the end of the day.

It will be at the end of the day. Yeah. I'm out. Well, There you go. It's not just me, Steve.

Where are you at, Steve? So here's, here's an interesting tidbit in and around all of this. I was listening to an interview with Barbara Corcoran about all this. You know, she was a former real estate agent, now multimillionaire. She's one of the people on Shark Tank. You know? Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

People know, people know who she is. Yeah.

I know who she is.

She was, she was talking about all this, and she was saying the interesting thing that's happening right now is that in 2024, It, you know, average housing prices have gone up 6%.

Oh, really?

Yeah.

That, that actually surprises me. I would have— I would wanna see some numbers on that.

Well, you know, I— because I believe her until I can see something that proves her wrong.

Well, only because I know, I know that because interest rates have gone up so much, it's, it's forced. So, like, we, I know we got a friend who's selling their house right now, and their house has been on the market for 16 days, and That, like, for me, whenever we sold our house and we sold it in, you know, 36 hours, like, that seems crazy.

An ungodly amount of time.

That's right.

Yeah. No, what she was saying is that on average housing prices have gone up 6%. Now that you had it, you know, taking all the big cities and ba ba ba ba ba.

And and there is increased value all the time, every year over year. Yeah.

But what she was saying is like, look, we still have a low inventory.

Yep.

And you have an interest rate that seems to be showing signs of going down.

It does.

And so if you, with a low inventory and interest price— interest rates going down, you're going to continue to see prices go up, right, on, on real estate. Um, and so like agents can bitch and moan about this all they want, right? They're going to be making more money if prices continue to go up. Yeah, especially with lower interest rates.

That's right.

You know, and, and so like, but at the same time, like, agents just need to be willing to adapt to the market that they're in, right? You know, that was the big— that was the complaint from agents all throughout COVID.

Yeah.

Is these Johnny-come-latelies that were making a killing for 3 months.

They were. That had—

hadn't been an agent for 2 seconds.

That's right.

You know, that all of a sudden have their license.

Yep.

And everyone's doing it because prices were so freaking high.

Yep.

You know, and, and so like, and, and look, you— I, I don't care like what conspiratorial news website you read or you adhere to, if you think the moon's flat, whatever. Like, if you, if you think for a second that the governing body that has control right now isn't going to do everything in their power to manipulate the market to lower interest rates come November, yeah, you're nuts.

They— yeah, they have to.

They will. They absolutely will. They'll do everything in their power to do it.

Yes, they will.

I don't know that it'll make sense, but like, this is, this is always the thing that happens, and then the market always responds after November.

It does. Do—

did we like the decision? Did we not like the decision? Um, but I, I can promise you, I'm— prediction right now, okay, interest rates are going to go down September, October, November.

I believe you. I—

And not because it makes sense.

No, but because there has to be, there has to be a way for them to gain a lot of immediate—

they need something tangible to show people, vote for us. That's exactly right. And they have the means to do it.

They do.

And they— why wouldn't they take advantage of that?

No, absolutely. So let me ask you a question. Do you think a realtor prefers, selling or buying?

Um, if I had to guess, I would say selling.

I, I would agree with you. The only reason I agree with you is because a buyer, you could hold on to that buyer for months, years, as they— especially depending on their scenario they're in. Um, and sellers just kind of wait, wait Till they come to me.

Sure. But I'm not saying that one does more work than the other.

I'm not either. I, I, I just can—

you just asked me which one the agent preferred.

Yeah, that's all I asked you.

And, and I don't want to get punched tomorrow night.

That's why. No, I, I, I feel like that's the answer that we would get. Now, we may both be shocked and, and say, no, I, I really prefer the opposite. But what this— what is interesting, let's say that I prefer a seller Over a buyer as an agent, this new scenario would cause me to want to be a buyer's agent. Really? Because I think I could make more money. Yeah.

To me, it's like which one is going to cause me more legwork.

I don't think it matters.

I think it's that's that's why I'm saying for me.

Sure. Yeah. But I I I think the buyers, the buyer agents will make more money in this new scenario because I think they have a chance to make money off of the buyer and off the seller.

Uh, potentially. I need to, I need to look into that and see if, if what you were saying was accurate though. Um, I'm not saying that it's not, I just don't know that it is.

I don't, I don't either. Look, we're, we're—

this is new. But if you're right, that's, that's, that's a fair point. Um, and like, if I, if I just go ahead and go, okay, like, let's, let's go ahead and just assume that you are.

Yeah.

Then I could see how a more, uh, ambitious agent would want to be a, a buyer's agent.

Yeah, you could, you could work less, make the same amount of money. Yeah. Or you can work more and make more money. Yeah. You know?

Yeah. And well, and then, you know, my, my thing has always with, with this has always been is I like that commissions are negotiable.

Oh, I do too.

I, I, I, I think that's extremely valuable, not just to me as the consumer, um, but to agents. I mean, like, because what I've said time and time again is like, look, if, if I'm a new agent, especially in this market, if, if I'm, you know, fresh outta real estate school and I'm looking down the road and, oh, there's Gary Green, you know, who's— I think he was with, with RE/MAX and now he's Better Homes and Gardens. But like, you— the dude's got offices everywhere. Everywhere. The guy's, the guy's been in the business for like 40 years.

Right.

You know, how, how do I, as, you know, I don't know, whatever, whatever, whatever brokerage you're in.

How do I get him?

How, how do I compete with him?

Can't.

Because I can't.

Nope.

You know, the, the only, the only lever I can pull is like, look, I can charge less than Gary.

Right.

Now, you're not— I'm not gonna have all the services and I'm not gonna have all the resources, but I can, I can save you thousands of dollars.

Right.

Um, and for some people, That's a good enough trade.

Sure.

But, you know, especially in a COVID market, right?

Oh, for sure. But on the flip side of that, let's say that you're— I want him as my, as my agent, right? Why would he take you on?

Yeah.

I mean, I've got a, I've got a $300,000 house. Why would you take me on versus this $3 million house that you could be selling?

Sure.

Well, what if I come to you and I say, I tell you what, I'll give you 6%?

Mm-hmm.

Instead of 3%.

Yeah.

At some point he might go, you know what, let's do it.

Yeah.

That— because at that point you—

You're right, you're right, it is inversible.

It is.

Yeah.

I mean, there's—

you can lure a better agent.

There's opportunity on both sides.

Yeah. And I think, I think that's probably the thing that a lot of agents aren't looking at is like, like they're going, you know, oh well, now I have to like compete with Joe Schmuck who's going to charge 2%. Yeah. And I need 3. And I'm like, well, be a good enough agent where you— that's the thing, they come knocking down your door to ask you to pay 4%.

That's, that's where I'm— that's where I look at this and I go, okay, um, you, you could have an agent that goes, look, I'm not going to do it for less than 4%, right? You go, why would I pay you 4%? Because I'm going to get it done faster and better. Yeah, I'm going to ensure that you get more money for your home. Yeah, I'll figure it out, you know, whatever. I'll get it. I'll get you more money and you'll do it. You'll do it quicker. You know, I don't know.

No, it's, it's, it's, it's a reasonable— it's a reasonable play.

It becomes a little more marketable. Like, you have, you have some leverage on one side or the other if you have money. If you don't have money, well, good luck.

Yeah, have fun.

But that's kind of life, isn't it?

It is.

Like, life is kind of that way. If you have money, you get attention.

Yeah.

Sorry.

Look, the way of the world.

It just is. I, I don't, I don't think it's better. I wish, I wish everyone could have equal opportunity, but it's just not the way it is, right? I'm sorry.

Kind of like, uh, you know, Neil Armstrong didn't stand on a flat surface.

It's just, if he did, he would have fallen right off because it's vertical.

It is, people. It's vertical. It's not horizontal. He would have just— he would have fallen slowly because there's less gravity, but Oh, man.

They're, they're, they're listening to this going, see? See?

They think it happened.

It didn't happen. It couldn't have.

Have you listened to any of that stuff?

No.

Oh, you should.

I, I, I'll tell you. I'll tell you that.

Okay. What's, what's, what's, like, what's, what? Okay. Like, like, okay. What's the most reasonable conspiracy theory you've ever heard?

Okay. The most reasonable.

The most reasonable.

9/11.

9/11.

Yep.

Which one's that?

The—

because there's several 9/11 conspiracy theories.

Yeah, specifically, uh, what is it, building number 7?

Uh-huh.

I think is what it is. That just randomly, multiple blocks away, just imploded straight down.

Uh-huh.

That's not the way that works.

Sure.

So it— the only—

You think there was some orchestration going on?

I think there was orchestration going on.

To what end?

What do you, what do you think? I don't know what the end was because, uh, because I can look at it from a lot of different ways and go, none of those ends played out. None of them. I, I think it, I think it did something to bring the country together for a while, right? But it didn't end up with better scenarios for us. I mean, now goodness gracious. You look at what it takes to get through an airport today versus— it's better today than it was back then for a while. But—

Yeah. I heard somebody talking the other day. It was like, it was some young adults and they're like, I watched Home Alone the other day. And like, there's no way they could have left that kid at home because none of those people went through security to get on that airplane to France.

That's exactly right.

I was like, I hadn't thought of that.

No, it's so true. But I, that's, that's one that, that I've looked at and I've gone, Oh, there's some weird, wacky stuff with that.

Sure. Well, I mean, just like, there's a lot of weird, wacky— like, there are.

What, for you, what is it?

The most reasonable one? I heard one recently. I need to look into it more, but it was talking about the number of politicians that had meetings with the Bilderbergs before they went in, before they got into office. Oh, and it's like a bunch of them.

Interesting.

Like, Obama had a meeting before he was a candidate. Bill Clinton had a meeting before he was a candidate. There's several senators and like, and like they're just kind of like this obscure— like no one denies that they exist.

Sure.

They're there and they're like, they're doing stuff, but no one knows what it is because it's like a secret society.

Right.

But like, let's see, I forget all— like Clinton and Obama were 2 big ones that stood out to me that were like, because like Obama was like a nobody, right? It's like a one-term senator from Illinois. And he takes a meeting with the Bilderbergs, and all of a sudden he's on the debate stage just wrecking Hillary. Right.

That did happen.

Like, I mean, like, he tore her to pieces over her husband's behavior in the Oval Office. And it's like, why could we— why should we expect anything less from you?

Right?

It's like, whoa.

Yep.

Who are you?

Yep.

And like, I mean, like, you know, good for you. But at the same time, like, where'd you come from?

That's right.

That's interesting.

Yeah.

And so, like, like, if you go through, like, the list of people that have met with the Bilderbergs and then all of a sudden rose to a position of power, It's interesting.

Okay.

So I don't know if there's anything to it, but—

What's funny about that is both of those are surrounding very high-end government.

Well, yeah, but I mean, I think any good conspiracy theory does.

Yeah, yeah, I would hope so.

Yeah. I mean, like, because I'm not into like the alien ones or anything like that. I think— I mean, like, look, I mean, like, I think that there's probably something. I could tell you all kinds of wacky and crazy stories from my own family. Sure. About that kind of stuff. Um, but I don't know how much merit there is to any of it, right?

So I kind of secretly hope there are aliens just because, you know.

Yeah, just because. Have you, um, what's the guy's name? Um, Bob Iger?

No.

Um, there's a few Bobs out there.

Hang on, are you thinking about Robert? Oh, I don't know who you're talking about. And we're on dead air.

Bob Lazar.

Okay.

Bob Lazar. Have you ever heard any, like, interviews with Bob Lazar?

I've heard of the name. I don't know much about him.

So he's an interesting one, man, because, like, he, he claims that he's seen all this stuff.

Oh.

And, like, he has, like, zero interest in media. He has, like, zero interest in being famous. And, like, he's been telling the same story since, like, the '70s.

Interesting.

And dude was like, there's, there's all sorts of weird stuff surrounding him. But, like, I think it was, I think it was, like, in the early '80s, like, he attached, like, a jet engine to a Honda and used it to drive to work. I mean, like, the dude was, like, really smart engineering and, like, it, like, makes a lot of sense that he would have been hired to, like, reverse engineer some stuff.

Interesting.

And that's what he claims that he was hired hired to do. Um, and he says the way that they would do it is they would give people with different specialties little pieces of things that they've collected over the years, have you look at it, examine it, and report back.

Um, interesting.

And he ended up, uh, basically spilling the beans by inviting— uh, he knew that, at least according to him— I'm not saying this is true.

Sure.

But at least according to him, he knew that the area where he was working, they were actually flying the UFOs that they had collected. Oh, and they— he knew where they were flying them. And apparently he got a little rowdy with some of his buddies, and he was telling them about it. And he knew what nights they did it and what times they did it. And so he actually took them out there and showed all of them.

Oh my.

And they all saw it and took footage of it.

Interesting. And we never heard from them again.

And he was fired.

Yeah. And, and we don't know who those men are.

And, and a lot of his past was erased, and at least according to him, right? Um, he's an interesting cat, man. And like, he's, he's like in a lab somewhere like doing independent research. Like, he just, he just wants to do science.

Well, and the fact that he's not out there like trying to make a name for himself all makes you— makes it more believable to me.

He's been on Rogan. And like, like, at least according to Joe, like, he didn't want to do it. Like, he was like throwing up before, like, was super anxious. And like, and so you hear something like that and you're like, okay, that tends to add a certain amount of credibility.

Yeah.

To it that like you actually don't want to like talk about this. And when you have talked about it, it's like the same over the span of like 3 or 4 decades.

You're not changing your story.

Yeah. That He's— there's a, there's a documentary about him you can watch.

Okay, um, I would love to.

It's, it's good. Um, again, I don't know that any of it's true.

Yep.

But there you go.

Interesting stuff.

Yeah.

Well, I'm really glad we got on this subject.

Me too.

But it is time to let everybody go. All right, it is time for us to wrap it up. And listen, if you have an opportunity, come hang out with us tomorrow at Moonshine Deck.

Fo' sho'.

We'll be there. If you haven't already, leave us a like and review. We would love that. Apple, uh, is a great place to do that. And, uh, like, subscribe, do all the things, tell your friends. Glad you're here. Till next time, y'all, we'll see you later.

See ya.