CALIFORNIA REAL ESTATE UPDATE #7

WHAT EVERYONE SHOULD KNOW ABOUT CONDITIONAL LICENSES!

To secure an Original Salespersons License, an applicant must submit evidence of completion of a Real Estate Principles Course and two other college-level real estate courses. An applicant can take the State exam and receive a Conditional License for 18 months by completing only the Principles Course. This is what most applicants do. Then during the eighteen month period, they must take the other two courses.

Following is the DRE Commission Regulation on the subject:

Other Thoughts: If I were a Broker, I would prefer that an applicant complete the three courses before taking the exam. This would increase their chances of passing the State Exam and as a broker I would not have to monitor their progress to an Original License. Many licensees do not complete this 18-month requirement in a timely fashion and they continue working. If they perform any real estate sales function and this is reported to the DRE, Brokers will find their names in the DRE Bulletin under the Restrictive Section. Also, I believe anyone who has the discipline and motivation to complete these three courses quickly would have a higher chance of succeeding.

If I were a License Applicant, I would complete Appraisal and Finance before taking the exam. These are the subject areas that cause the most exam failures, so extra study would be helpful. If I have an Original License, I might look better to a prospective hiring broker and I save money on the fees.

Final Thought: A State regulation states that college-level course materials must be received at least 2 1/2 weeks before a student is allowed to take a final exam. Therefore, to complete two courses would require 5 weeks. Many conditional licensees do not allow enough time to complete the courses before the 18 month date. They are "out of business" and Brokers should make sure "they ain't doing real estate".

IMPORTANT CHANGES TO C.A.R. PURCHASE CONTRACTS

If you have been working in California Real Estate for any period of time, you realize that the CAR Purchase Contract is an ever changing document. Years and years ago it was one page and it grew to eight legal-size pages. Then, it went back to six legal-size pages, and now it's eight 8.5" x 11" pages. About two years ago the title of the form was changed to Residential Purchase Agreement and Joint Escrow Instructions as escrow instructions are now included.

Now, there is another change coming to our Purchase Contracts. About two years ago another RPA was designed that was to be used by Northern California companies. For the last two years CAR has published an RPA-11 and the AEPA-11 (Area Edition Purchase Agreement). This is scheduled to be changed again before October 2002. After that date only one form will be published.

The Northern California form does have a few differences. If you would like to review a copy, it is on Page One of the Sample Forms Book from CAR.

At the present moment I believe that the AEPA form is buyer friendly. If I were making an offer for a buyer on another company's listing, I would use the AEPA form, but if I had an offer from another company on a listing of mine, I would want to use the RPA. If I was working as a dual agent, I wouldn't know what to do (just an absurd random thought.

Not being a Forms guru, I can not explain all of the nuances between the two Purchase Contracts but you should check the Termite Clause (as to who pays for what), Removal of Contin- gency Clause (Active vs. Passive), and the 17-day Buyer Right of Cancellation (Section 14 in the current AEPA).

In my opinion the new form is going to be more like the Northern California form. What does this mean to Real Estate Associates in Southern California? You are going to have a new form to master that will have an effect on how you handle termites, contingencies, cancellations, etc.

What should you do? You can check the new RPA-11 (10/02 revision) on the CAR Web site. Laura Williamson from CAR was most helpful in giving me guidance in this area. Go to www.car.org and click to the Legal Home Page. Next you should go to Standard Forms Updates, Form Revisions. The material includes drafts, revisions, discussions, etc. You can submit any comments to CAR and your input will be considered. Do not wait. The new RPA has a "10/02" print date and that is sooner than you realize.

In my opinion, the Forms Committee of CAR and the legal Staff do an outstanding job in designing and changing the forms. It is a thankless task and they work long and hard.

However, I don't always agree with them. For example, putting the information from the Seller's Financing Addendum on the eight page form was not a bright decision. Only about 1% of the house sales were using seller financing at that time and yet the information was there to confuse 99% of sellers and buyers. Also, I have never understood that if time is of the essence, why there is not a place on the Listing Agreement and the Purchase Contract for Time of Day. Time of Day is on the Agency Disclosure and the Counter Offer. If I want to show proof that I gave the Agency Disclosure to a buyer or seller before the Contracts and Agreements were executed, I would write the Time Of Day on the Contracts and on the Agreements.

There is one other interesting point in the Arbitration Sec- tion. It states unequivocally that the arbitrator must be a retired judge or justice or an attorney with at least 5 years residential real estate experience unless the parties mutually agree to a different arbitrator. I believe that one of the reasons we are getting so many ridiculous decision from these actions if this sentence. There are many capable arbitrators who are not retired judges, retired justices or attorneys.

I would like to thank all the CAR Realtors and Staff over the years for their work in the Forms Arena. People like Noel Seaman, Neil Kalin, Laura Williamson, Jeff Kahn, Steve Sakol, Erik Jorgenson, Sandy Weisberg, and of course Bob Hunt of San Clemente, the Form's Czar of CAR.

A LOOK BACK AT MOVIES

Last year there were several movies that got great exposure through Academy Awards, Golden Globe, etc. I would like to recommend a few movies that were not so highly publicized. Have you ever been at a rental store and didn't see anything you liked in the thousands of possibilities? Here are a few thoughts and I submit these with no humility whatsoever.

Some of my favorite 2001 rental movies:

COMPLETE INFORMATION ON REAL ESTATE LICENSING

PRIVACY STATEMENT and UNSUBSCRIBING

DUANE GOMER, INC., DOES NOT SELL, RENT, LOAN, TRADE, LEASE OR OTHERWISE TRANSFER ANY PERSONAL INFORMATION COLLECTED ON OUR SITE, INCLUDING REGISTRATION FORMS OR E-MAIL LISTS, TO ANY THIRD PARTY. WE WILL TREAT ANY INFORMATION YOU PROVIDE AS CONFIDENTIAL INFORMATION AND WILL NOT DISCLOSE IT TO ANY THIRD PARTY. IF YOU RECEIVED THIS IN ERROR, WE WILL PROMPTLY UNSUBSCRIBE YOU FROM OUR MAILING LIST, AND WE APOLOGIZE FOR ANY INCONVENIENCE.