The rules for advertising on social media platforms are NOT exactly the same as the rules for putting a link to the IABS and CPN on a social media platform used as a business website because the requirements for each rule differ.

Rule 535.155, Advertisements

The One to Four Family Residential Contract (Resale), like many contracts, contains a “Notices” provision. In that TREC contract, the provision is in Paragraph 21. This needs to be filled out so the parties know where a notice should be sent or delivered to be effective. A license holder should remind their client how important this provision is and ensure, to the extent possible, that it gets filled out fully and accurately.

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.

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.

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 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.

Texas Real Estate Commission adopted new advertising rules at its November meeting. These rules are effective as of May 15, 2018, which gives license holders 6 months to comply with the updated requirements.
§535.154 lays out alternate, assumed business and team name registration requirements and §535.155 lays out the revised advertising requirements. You can read both rules on our website.

In the wake of Hurricane Harvey, the Texas Real Estate Commission and the Texas Appraiser Licensing and Certification Board (the Agency) extended all deadlines for two months for all license holders and applicants statewide with license expiration or application deadlines in August and September. This extension ended on October 31, 2017.