NAR’s Clear Cooperation Decision – Confusion Ahead?

Hey, welcome back to the podcast. Super excited to have Brian from Thousand Watt. Brian, there is so much change happening in the industry right now. Today we want to talk about ccp, the new rules, the new changes. What might agents, teams and brokers be thinking about today? But just for a moment, like the people that don't know who you are or Thousand Watt, just give them a quick little intro so they understand why. When I read your article, I was like, I text Brian immediately and said, let's do a podcast. So share with my audience, give a little insight.

Absolutely, Tom. So Thousand Watt is a strategy and creative firm that focuses on the real estate industry exclusively. We work with teams, agents, brokers, prop tech firms, mortgage companies, builders, title companies. Personally, I've been in the real estate business for 28 years. I love it and it's super interesting right now.

1,000%. And by the way, shout out. You guys have a branding conference coming up. I'm gonna be there. I think like 30 of my top team leaders are all coming. So let's make sure sometime today we talk about that as well.

Awesome.

But let's, let's get to the, the genesis of this. So I did a, I did a show recently and for my friends, maybe you, maybe you saw it, maybe you're a part of it. We went live and we talked about the only thing that's constant in our industry as in the world, is change and the sort of the question mark around clear cooperation. You've got, you know, one company that's clearly fighting for. We want pocket listings and exclusive listings. And we believe that that's the right way and the consumer deserves a choice. You got other brokers that are saying everything needs to be transparent, everything needs to be available for the consumers. And if we cut them off, we aren't we really stopping or having an impact on fair housing. And so you've got this sort of great divide and debate between the two. Funny enough, one of my coaches was a part of the 2018 ruling who was the then president of the association of Realtors in her marketplace. And she was like, she's very much pro this way. And I can argue, I kind of can understand Compass's position.

Right.

I don't, I don't think it's entirely right. But we find ourselves in that place prior to the ruling of we don't know what's going to happen. And everybody was sort of mixed about it. So. So maybe just unpack for me the first part. What, what do you think Compass's position was and why do you think or what do you think they're going to do now that there is that little extended window?

Yeah.

It'S complicated, Tom, when you get into the details, but at a high level. I think what Compass has been doing for years, this is not a recent thing, is no part of Compass's business strategy has been private listings, which is an entirely rational and reasonable strategy for a brokerage company trying to become profitable in an era where it's hard to be profitable as a brokerage company. It's per. Perfectly legitimate and rational strategy. So that push towards private listings has accelerated in the last couple years as Compass has needed to show profitability, has cut costs, and has grown in needs to show growth and bottom line profits. And private listings have become their cause over the last year, especially led by their CEO, charismatic guy, Robert Rufkin. And they have gone full court press to get the national association of Realtors to repeal or significantly weaken this clear cooperation policy, which was instituted in 2019 largely in response to Compass's effort with private listings all the way back then. So it's kind of this full circle moment where, you know, honestly, Compass has really been the straw that serves the drink on a lot of this dynamic for years now and is at the center of this arena mixing it up.

Yes.

So what happened yesterday was not a resolution at all to this battle. It was probably.

Just a, an extension of it, if I'm honest. Sure.

So. So for the person that maybe they didn't read the news yesterday, why don't you unpack what the rule, what the new little, let's just call it movement is. We, we all thought it was going to either be nothing.

Yeah.

The destruction of it or a little movement or maybe a few big moves that, that gave everybody sort of a. I don't know, a better advantage, whatever that means. So, so unpack for the person that doesn't know, just high level, what was the adjustment? And then let's get into maybe the other side where I think of like Leo over at EXP who's been screaming from the rooftop saying this is horrible and it's wrong. So, but, but first, what are the adjustments?

Sure. The adjustments were really.

It was kind of a decision, non decision. So there were some people who wanted the NAR to just turf clear cooperation policy. Compass among them. There were others who wanted them to strengthen. There were some who said, well, we kind of keep it, but modify it. What the N did yesterday was basically to hedge their bet and to make nobody happy.

Yes.

So what they did was to keep clear Cooperation to keep that policy in place as is. But they added an entirely new policy called the Multiple Listing Options for sellers policy.

Yes.

Which creates a new type of listing within the MLS system, a new listing status called the delayed marketing exempt listing, which is very elegant phrasing. Very elegant phrasing. So what they said is, okay, we're getting hammered by Compass and others and have some legal exposure because we need to give sellers more choice. But then we want to protect buyers and the integrity of the housing market and fair housing and all that stuff. So what we're going to do is keep this policy called clear cooperation, which limits the marketing of private listings, and we're going to add some seller choice stuff with this new policy.

Right.

So they kind of split the difference. And the net effect of it all, Tom, is that nobody is really happy about this. Yes. And for the average practitioner out there helping clients, what happened is just another layer of complexity has been put onto their conversations with their clients and their process that they go through with sellers to evaluate. Here's your choices. Here are your options. Yeah, it, you know, more complexity, which is, I think, to people listening to this podcast, kind of the story of the last couple of years.

Sure. Now, I'm probably wrong when I say this, and correct me if I am, in my experience, the only people that really want to be on the market but not be on the market. You know, a pocket listing as an example is the super high end, super net worth. You know, we. Or. Or kind of super high end, super net worth. We don't want anybody to know. Or, you know, higher end. We want to test the market, but we don't want open houses. We don't want anybody just showing up to our house. And then on the flip side, it's the. I just bought a house out of bankruptcy that, you know, the former owner removed the toilets every. You know, it's just this shell of an abomination of a house, and I might flip that to somebody else, buy it and flip it to somebody else, or I might buy it, fix it up, and. And, you know, maybe. Maybe I'm an independent person, not a real estate agent. I just want to have that thing sold. So I think it's. Am I wrong in this? Like, I. I don't think it's an everyday real estate agent issue. And to your point, it's now one more damn piece of paperwork that I've got to explain and understand. You know, like, it just feels like one more thing.

It is one more thing. And what the NAR did And I'm sympathetic to their position. They're back on their heels. They're under siege. They've dealt with a lot over the past few years is they kind of waffled on this and they didn't make a clear decision and they didn't make things simpler one way or the other. They just kind of added, as you said, and I said, aware of complexity. And I think really your assessment of private listings is accurate. Historically, they've always existed. We always had private listings.

Exactly.

Even after the clear cooperation policy was instituted six years ago, we still had private listings. You just had to keep them within your brokerage office. Okay. And we will continue to have private listings. Yes. It's a niche thing. And there are certain sellers. We've actually done research on this and we figured it's about 4% tops. Yes. Where this is something that they come to the table and ask their listing agent to do for the reasons, for example, you know, of, you know, privacy, celebrity, whatever it may be. Right. Always a niche thing. The thing that changed the game here, and I don't say this being you know, encompasses a very, very good real estate brokerage with very smart people. I disagree personally with their position here, but it is a rational business strategy. The thing that changed the entire conversation around this was Compass, which is now by volume among the top two or three real estate brokerages in. The company built private exclusives into the heart of its business strategy. And they are trying to take it beyond a niche thing that most agents only kind of deal with every once in a long while into the heart of their business.

Yes.

And NAR and this policy stood in the way of that strategy. So they went on a massive scorched earth campaign to weaken that policy or overturn it and agitate. And they've been pretty darn effective. So I hate to put all of this on Compass, but they really have done a masterful job at driving the whole dynamic around this issue.

Well, this is certainly for the listener. This the first time we haven't seen, you know, a, a company essentially go after legislation to make it to their advantage.

Right.

Like I'm. You think about how many companies that have done that in the past or, you know, I mean, that just. It is what it is. So now on the flip side of this, I wrote down and you, you know, you, you kind of touched on inside the article. Mls, IDX sites, portals, brokerages, teams. You know, if you're, if your average sales price is, is not ultra luxury and you're not dealing with those kind of Sellers, you could almost just turn the podcast off. It almost doesn't matter. Right. And totally right. But you know, if you want to keep listening, Brian is a handsome guy and, you know, you should probably check out his branding that's coming up. I'm going to be there. It's going to be super fun. I'm not even speaking there. I'm just hanging out because I love partners.

Well, honored to have you.

So let's go back to.

You make a good point, Tom, though I want to pause on that.

Yeah.

And when something happens in the quote unquote industry, people like me, you know, always say, well, this is a big deal for this reason and it kind of is maybe at a high industry level, long term, strategically. But the end of the day, it's almost never the case that the working practitioner needs to do anything at all.

Right.

So you're right. There's a new listing status. This policy that existed isn't going away.

Yeah.

Go on with your business.

Yeah.

You know, unless something like last year happens where we have a legal settlement where you have to work with buyers in an entirely different way, handle open listing presentation conversations differently. Right. Well, sure. Then you got to pay attention this. You're right. Unless you deal if the list this is salient in your business or your market. Keep going.

Exactly. Keep up the good work. We love you. We're proud of you. Keep helping more buyers and sellers and enjoy your spring market.

Yes.

But, but on the flip side, IDX sites, which a lot of agents have and a lot of brokerages have, portals are going to be impacted by this, I think. So unpack that for me and then just sort of general rules for, you know, brokerages today because there may be, look, look, there's always, there's always a marketing play. Right. Like the market just markets along. But those of us that win are the ones that, you know, exploit, for lack, lack of a better word, the new change, the new policy, the first mover advantage. To say, if you were thinking about this, we can help you with that. So, so, but, but unpack portals, IDX sites and brokerages in your mind. What are the, what are the obvious pivots and adjustments they're going to make? And then let's, let's get back to, you know, does this really impact consumers? And I do want to talk about Leo's position as well.

Yeah, for sure, for sure. So idx, let's talk about that. So most of your listeners know what that is. Internet data exchange. It's where all the agents and brokers share their listings, put them on each other's websites. They go in software like cmas, etc, okay? So because the NAR has created this new listing status in the mls, the delayed Marketing exempt listing, okay, there are going to be more agents who check that box. And what that means is it's in the MLS to all the agents and brokers in the mls. They can see it, but it doesn't go out to IDX sites, which ranges from your individual real estate agent site with an IDX feed to Zillow, which is powered by idx. Okay, Right. So to the extent that more agents might check that box and say, delay the marketing, don't put it out there publicly, some of those sites are going to have a less complete view of the market through their home search, which is powered by idx. So it's going to take a while to see how that plays out. It could have big effects. It may not have big effects. It's hard to tell, but there is something there.

Fun fact for the person listening right now, if you're somewhat of a data nerd as I am, if you look at the number of listings that were on the market in 2017, 2018, 2019, when we were complaining, Brian, there's no inventory. We have about the same number of homes for sale right now as we record this near the end of March in 2025. And you know what? People are saying, oh my God, we have too much inventory.

You're right. It always takes, I think, 120 days, sometimes six months before we really see the impact. But if you were, if you were sitting down with a broker today, a team leader or an agent today that was on the buy side heavily or the list side. Let's look at both. What are the adjustments you would be telling them or at least saying you might want to consider the following.

Well, if I were not a compass agent or a compass team lead and I wasn't sort of actively promoting a private listing strategy or what they call their three step marketing strategy.

Yes.

If I'm a listing agent, unless my seller came to me and said, hey, look, you know, I kind of got these privacy concerns about my home, etc, you don't even have to mention it.

Or I just want to test the market.

Test the market.

I think that that is actually something that everybody can relate to. Like, well, you know, Brian, we just want to test the market. We're not sure where we're going to go next. And of course the agent wants to put it right in the market and maybe, maybe for some people, the test the market strategy, which is what the delayed marketing exempt listing is now.

Yes. Although it goes in the mls, Tom, So unlike, you know, just kind of dabbling it out there a little bit when it goes to the mls. If, if a, if an agent in the MLS wants to show it, you have to let them show it. Right. So it's like, it's not just putting your toe into the market, it's like putting your whole left leg into the market.

Got it, Got it.

But.

Yeah, I, I think, you know, if you're a listing agent, you can probably just ignore this unless your seller asks about it.

Right.

If you're a buyer's agent, you know, if. Or working with a buyer honestly, you know, unless there's big gaps in the market.

You'Re not going to feel, I think, a significant effect here.

Yeah.

Because even if a bunch of, of agents or brokers now use this marketing delayed listing status, you can still see it within the MoS and show it to your client. So, you know, I'm not thinking there's going to be any big shift for agents who are working with buyers either.

Yes. It's interesting. You know, my travels have taken me all over the world and, you know, helping real estate agents in every country in Europe, Australia, New Zealand, et cetera. But I think Europe, specifically, when I started working there 16, 17 years ago, shout out to ReMax of Europe, Michael Posler, all my friends there, all the leaders, all the agents, you know, massive company. It was not that long ago that we were introducing the concept. Hey, Brian, the next time you list a property in District 1 in Vienna, near the Ritz Carlton, you know what you should do? You should let all the other agents in the office know about it.

Yes.

I mean, you know, like, that's how real estate's been done there forever and only. And again, shout out to, you know, at least I know if you're, if you're out there in Europe and you're not with this company, like, maybe you guys are doing it too. But I just have much more insight on this, this organization. It took us 10 years to make that transition where people started saying, let's cooperate with other agents. So when I think about this, in some aspects, we're still doing that, but I also think we are going to make it harder for buyers potentially.

Believe me, I understand what you're talking about. And the irony of this is, is that while the rest of the world desires and craves this NLS system that we have, we have spent the last few Years now, debating ways to weaken it.

Right. Degrading, in fact.

Right. Ultimately. Right. If you keep more listings private, you're weakening the mls, which may benefit you or your company or your team in the short term, but ultimately it's good for nobody. And I'll tell you, I bought a property in Italy three years ago and I went through that process as a buyer and it was like fumbling around in the dark. Right.

Four or five different websites and each property listed by multiple agents, non exclusive. And you can find it as a for sale, bound or by the homeowner.

Absolutely.

People don't realize, like, that's how it's done today.

There's no sales comps, there's no CMAs, there's no market charts.

Title insurance stuff.

Yeah. Right.

Pull a title report. We don't have one.

Totally. I. I always say, I sometimes say to, to agents, I say, look, you get asked the question all the time, how's the market?

Yeah.

Well, how do you answer that? How do you know? Well, you know, I mean, you're a smart person, you pay attention. You're on brokerage war. But ultimately we can all kind of know the answer to that question because the MLS exists. Right. And all of the derivative effects from that, the charts, the Graphs. Right. The CMAs, it all stems from this pool of listings, this magical thing that we have created of competitors cooperating that the rest of the world doesn't have. And somehow we managed to create this near miraculous thing in the United States of America. And that thing we are putting into jeopardy and we're playing with fire, in my opinion, and we may come to regret it.

Yes. Yes. And shout out to all of our friends in Canada too. They've. They've been.

Yeah.

Very, very, very similar. All right, so. So what do you think Leo's position is and what do you think he's doing right now? You know, Leo's a pal, Rob's a pal. I try and be as close and friendly as you are to, you know, all the major movers and shakers. What's he thinking?

Look, I mean, and I'll just say that I disagree with Compass's position. I think it's wrong, but I also understand it. It's a rational business position and it's a very fine company.

Yes.

Now, Leo's position, exp. And there have been other leaders, but Leo has really come out strongly on the, on the pro, ccp, anti private listing side. Yes. And his position is, look, don't hide houses. Don't hide houses. Right. Because.

That'S just not a good idea because we want transparency, we want visibility. We want everybody to have an open door to housing in the United States of America. Everybody in the street believes that. And to the extent that you put listings behind a curtain or a wall and hold them back and hide them, you are working against that end. And that's his position. It's openness, fair housing, clarity, confidence, transparency. And also sort of along the lines of what I talked about, sort of like, okay, guys, do we really want to go down the road of messing with this MLS thing? That kind of annoys us sometimes, but ultimately we all benefit from in the long run. And he's been a very passionate advocate for that. And he's kind of. He and Robert Refkin are kind of the. The two big industry broker players who are going toe to toe on this.

Yes, yes, yes.

So.

So when is the next ruling? When do you think there'll be another legislative change and any prediction on what that might be?

I don't think there's going to be another change from, From NAR here. So nar, when you think about this decision, I know lots of people are angry about nar. Sure. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

People have too much time on their hands. Brian.

Yeah, Honestly, I mean, it's. I get it. Right. There's not a lot of love for NAR out there right now. Nar, the way to think about this decision that they made this week is NAR is a large institution. And what a large institution does and is obligated to do is to protect the institution. So by coming out with kind of this waffling, kind of irritate everybody a little, make everybody maybe a little bit happy and add a ton of complexity. They did what they needed to do to protect themselves and to protect the institution. I think they're. They're good now. They're not going to do anything else. There will be some litigation. Maybe, you know, Compass will sue them because they wanted them to go further. Maybe there's some fair housing advocates who sue them. Like, the litigation is not sure. I don't think any is going to do anything further. I think they put out this thing that's like, okay, we gave everybody a little bit of something maybe, and they're going to leave it be.

What about Catch Mark? I know they were watching when we did our show. You know, it's.

Yeah.

I just assume they're making themselves vocal about all these things.

Catch Mark is sort of the. The dark overlord hovering over the industry, trying to figure out when To. To swoop in and. Yeah. I mean, he made a statement a couple weeks ago saying that did not get rid of the clear cooperation policy, which it did not. Okay. Did not know that he was going to depose the individual members of the n. Executive committee who voted for it. I mean, this guy is.

I mean, is he anti. Is he anti fair housing? Like, what?

No.

Do you know what I mean? Like. Or is he just. Just another attorney?

He's another attorney, but I suppose there is some intellectual consistency in his position that the Sitzer case, which he won in 2023, you know, I didn't think it did anybody any good. No, personally, but it was premised on this idea that sellers should have more choice. So in his mind, the clear cooperation policy limits seller choice.

I get it.

And so, like, he's going to keep chewing on that bone, so who knows? Yeah, he's gonna. I don't think we're done with Michael. Catch Mark. He's gonna resurface. He's like, you know, at the end of an 80s horror movie when you think the bad guy's dead and in the ground. Right, right. And then the hand reaches up from the grave, like, that's Catchmark. He's coming. He's coming back.

Yeah. Interesting. All right. On a much lighter, much more fun note, I am all, like, I've been to. What did you guys call it before?

It was.

I always turn on.

That was kind of a different thing to me.

It was Thousand Watapalooza. Right. Like, you know, Mark was going to have someone dancing on stage. There was going to be herbs, you know, and, you know, smoke and fun and weird oboes and, you know, but. But always fascinating, creative, interesting people. Now you're doing this brand conference. Like. Like, if someone was, you know. Yeah. Like, what does that mean? Like, I want to stand out. I want to have a better brand. Like, is it. Are you going to. Are we talking about, like, designing colors and I like to wear white jackets. Are we talking about that? Like, what's the. What's the point of this?

No. Although, you know, we could get into the fashion and styling, but, you know, I. Well, to back up, we're doing a brand and marketing summit. Thousand wide Brand and marketing summit. We did our first one in 2024. Yes. The 2025 event is literally two weeks from now in Dallas. Yeah. In your backyard, Tom. The eighth and ninth at Gillies at Dallas. And it's two days where we have convened the best minds on marketing, branding, positioning, messaging strategy in real estate and outside of real estate to come together and help people figure out in this weird moment, it's never been more important how to differentiate, how to clarify what they stand for, how they're different, their value proposition and to think strategically about their brand and their marketing. And really, in this moment, with so much competitive energy still 1.5 million agents chasing roughly 4 million deals this year, like it's, it's time to differentiate and to build your brand 100 now more than ever. Because it's tough out there.

Yeah, well, that's why I'm going to be there. And I'm, you know, you're speaking all my love language. I actually just went through, you know, between you and Mark for the last, you know, a couple decades in our friendship. You guys have always helped me position, reorganize, think through language at the right way. And I think everybody sit there sitting, listening right now knows whether you're an individual agent or a team or a broker.

You know, when you look at how consumers select real estate agents, right. It's kind of a, you know, a dart, you know, being thrown in the dark. And, and when you read all the consumer, wow, it's just the first person I met and you know, she was nice, he was nice.

And then you see the numbers, you know, my nephew or my soccer coach's kid or whatever, and I know them, right?

Yeah, that's okay. But I would argue for the person listening here, Brian, I, I am fun. I've always fundamentally believed, I know you've heard me say this before, that the consumer deserves a more reliable, more predictable, more quality real estate experience. And I know there are a lot of agents that I love them, that's exactly what they provide. But it's very hard for me to fathom that somebody that sells a home now and then, like once a year is really going to be the most reliable, most predictable, best communicator, best negotiator. And I'm not dogging, like, I'm not, you know, there's all these industry, you know, someone's going to be mad. Like, you know, what about the brand new agent? I'm talking about the person that's just every now and then they do a transaction that, that sounds like every now and then they fly an airplane. Like, I don't want to be on that airplane. So I'm not, I'm not. Someone's going to be pissed and I'll see the comments.

Exactly.

Understand the.

The stakes are high and if you look at the data and I'll misquote This, what is it like 88% of consumers say, yeah, I would work with that agent again. And only 12% do.

Yeah.

So now we know there's a lot of reasons why they don't follow up. They're out of the industry. You know, they met somebody else.

Yeah.

You know what I mean? And that's a whole other conversation. But my point is the, the thing to do today is to create measurable degrees of separation. So people say, I know, Brian, but I gotta talk to Savannah. Right. I mean, Savannah is the clear winner of the race of who is the best educator, who is the best advisor, who is the most tech enabled or whatever your brand positioning is. And I think that that's why I bring in all my clients to come to this. Not all, but a bunch of my clients are coming to this event with me.

No, and I think you're exactly right, Tom. The way that I think about it is the, the real estate industry is this undifferentiated blob.

Yeah.

And what happens in an under differentiated blob where the best people don't stand out is the best agents, teams and brokerages don't win as much as they should.

Yep.

And if they want to win more Bingo. And grab more share, they need to stand out from the undifferentiated mass. And how do you do that? Yes. By building a differentiated brand, sharpening your value proposition, toning your, your messaging just right. Otherwise you're just part of this blob and you're going to win. You can succeed, but you're not going to win as often as you should.

Bingo. Bingo. I love it. I love it. Well, hey, listen, I was literally texting you last time the plane, hey, could you jump in really fast? And we both said we only got this time, so we were able to do it. We're going to put this out as fast as possible. For my friend listening, thank you so much. Always just for who you are. Being a part of my. That's a big, you know, big thing that I stand for and believe in. And Brian, thank you always for the work that you and Mark and all the partners at Thousand Watt do to, to help us elevate our brand and talk about the things that are happening in the industry in an intelligent way. So, you know, appreciate you always, my friend.

You know, back at you, Tom. You're an inspiration to tons of people in this industry. You've been an inspiration to Mark and I and just love what you do. So thank you. It's always good to talk with you appreciate it, partner.

All right, I'll see you in a couple weeks. And for my friend watching, share this, maybe with the person that might be concerned or two. Hopefully it'll get them off the fence and just realize, hey, it's one more thing we need to talk about. Let's just keep go helping buyers and sellers. That's what we do all day long.

All right.

Thank you so much for watching. We look forward to seeing you on the next show. Take care.

Sam.