The Commission held its regular quarterly meeting on Monday, May 7 at our HQ in Austin. The Executive Director was delayed for about an hour arriving for the meeting due to air travel delays on Sunday that resulted in a cross-country reroute and pushed his final flight to Monday morning.  So our very able Deputy Executive Director and General Counsel Kerri Lewis delivered the Executive Director’s report.    

Definitions:

Broker Assumed Business Name (DBA) is another name for the broker’s business that can be used by all sponsored sales agents and brokers associated with this broker. Another name that indicates a broker’s line of business, e.g.  property management or commercial is also a DBA.

The mission and performance of the Texas Real Estate Commission and Texas Appraiser Licensing & Certification Board are under review by the Legislature as required under the Texas Sunset Act.  The Act provides that the Sunset Commission, composed of legislators and public members, periodically evaluate a state agency to determine if the agency is still needed and to explore ways to ensure that the agency's funds are well spent.  Based on the recommendations of the Sunset Commission, the Texas Legislature ultimately decides whether an agency continues to operate into the future.

TREC has been made aware of a scam requesting information from license holders. The request is sent by email by someone posing as the Texas Real Estate Commission and asks that information be provided to them and provides a link to follow (see example emails).

Please disregard emails asking you to provide information to TREC, especially anything linking to a third party website.  If you have a question about a request for payment from TREC, you can contact us at: information@trec.texas.gov with “SCAM Notice” in the subject line.

The Texas Real Estate Commission is pleased to announce the appointment of members to the Broker Responsibility Working Group (BRWG). The BRWG reviews experience requirements and role responsibilities for brokers and makes recommendations to the Commission based on its findings. Members will meet four or five times in the next 10 months to complete the charge given to them by the Commission.  

Monday, April 2 in Austin from 10 AM to 3 PM.

Join us for our Agency’s 2nd annual Texas Residential Realty Summit. This annual conference focuses on current issues affecting the successful closing of single family residential transactions transaction from an interdisciplinary perspective.

The Inspector Committee met in Austin on January 22nd to discuss a packed agenda. Several inspectors made the trip to Austin for this meeting.  I would like to thank everyone who took time out of their busy schedules to attend and I appreciate your important input.  Inspector attendance at these meetings is invaluable because it provides the Committee the opportunity to hear the ideas and concerns of inspectors from all over the state.  The Committee is meeting again on Monday, February 26^th at 10am.

It was a busy year for the Inspector Committee on the education front. The major accomplishment for the committee was completing the much-needed revision on the SOP Legal and Ethics continuing education coursework, which became mandatory as of September 1 of last year.

The effective date of the new rules is May 15, 2018, and we want to make sure everyone is thoroughly prepared for the changes.

Background

These rules are the result of years of work by the Commission and key stakeholders focusing on clarity of advertisements for consumers with the least restrictions on license holders. The rules also update, interpret and balance revised statutory requirements supporting free commerce and business competition with those protecting the consumer from misleading advertisements.