Plaintiffs Win: The Go Forward Plan on How to Run Your Real Estate Business

Hi, everybody. Welcome to the no News day in residential real estate. Oh, man.

What do we. I don't understand what's going on, Keith, Is there something important today?

I just thought we could talk about the importance of staging and color theory when taking a listing.

Well, look, it wouldn't be a webinar on residential real estate if we didn't use the words AI.

Oh, yes. Slow day for Inman. Exactly, David, exactly. Okay, we're gonna pause for just a second. We've literally had hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people register. So we will pause just for a second while people are logging in. Thank you for carving out a little time. News just came down. We've been talking about this for months. As many of you know, felt like the best thing we could do was just now that it was official with the verdict, we would jump on a webinar and share with you as much as we know. Let's be really transparent. We are getting this information in real time. We will have some answers, but not all the answers. You are encouraged to ask questions, but you may hear from us things like, great question. We're not sure, but here's what we think. You may hear that from time to time, but we've always believed in keeping communication very high. And it's never more important than in times like this that you keep an open dialogue going and that you share as much as you can. That's why we opened it up for the entire industry. Some of you. This may be the first time you're ever seeing James and I. Maybe we should do introductions, but I don't know, let's.

No, everybody knows us.

Get to the stuff. Right. So we're glad you're here. And we are at capacity for the webinar, so no need to wait any longer for that. When the verdict came down, James and I were prepared and had some thoughts. Might be interesting just to start with. We both have been on record saying we hope it doesn't happen, but we think NAR et al. Will probably lose. So we weren't surprised by the verdict. Were you surprised at all by the amount? James, let's start. I know, shocker. First question. I'm already off script, but.

No, yeah. The reason why is just commentary that I've had and heard from the, you know, from the trial. You have people that are there that have been through the trial telling me things. Plaintiff's lawyers look like they're from Missouri and resonated with the jury. And unfortunately, the defendant's lawyers look like they were from New York. And, and this sounds really weird and I know that's simplifying stuff, but you know, those, those things you see on TV shows, they don't just get made up out of thin air. Like some of that stuff's real.

Yeah, they're usually exaggerated, but there's still some truth there. Right?

I mean, you need to resonate with a jury. And I think that this most important part, you just, I mean, just. I'm going to break this down from a psychological perspective. You know, everyone's hurting for money in America right now. And you know, Americans are greedy. I love us, but we are. So you know the reality.

There's a few lawyers that aren't today that couple lawyers that are not.

I mean, that's, They've, they've got to still get it, but we'll get there. The doesn't surprise me. And it doesn't surprise me that we're, we're here. I've stated this publicly. NAR needed to fight this. You know, there need to show some strength in that. But I think this kind of will lead into our conversation. These numbers are irrelevant. Like, I just want to make sure everybody understands this. The number doesn't mean anything. So let me just make sure everybody really understands my comment here. So remax and Anywhere both have settled previous to the trial. They got themselves excluded from it. They not only settled with Burnett, but they settled with Morel and no select, the two other class action cases. What that means is they were in a room with all of the plaintiffs and their lawyers negotiating a settlement. In addition, they opened that settlement up nation wide. What that means is it's not just in Maryland and in 20 markets with Morrell and in Missouri, they got the class opened up to cover the entire U.S. so when ReMax settled for $55 million, it's every homeowner in the United States that sold a house during that time frame is part of the class now. So they're really not going to get a lot of money, by the way. And same thing with, with anywhere. Why that's an important thing to remember is they settled for 55 million for ReMax and 83 and a half million for anywhere. If in the grand scheme of lawsuits that sounds big, but that's actually not. It's a very small number. And what that shows is the plaintiffs are wanting to settle these cases. So even though there's a $1.78 billion judgment essentially today, that is likely not going to be the number that is going to end up being paid out. Because what everyone needs to understand is if they don't have that cash, your only option is bankruptcy. And that doesn't help the plaintiffs or their clients. And lawyers don't take cases to, you know, not make money. So I think it's incredibly important for people to remember that when you see these big numbers, it's not. It's relevant, but it really isn't. It's just a starting point in negotiation. That leads me to the second thing that I'll. And then we'll converse on this, Keith, is what is likely going to happen now is you're going to see defendants appeal because that's what they do. And everyone's like, oh, it's going to peel out for three to four years, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And that it's not actually accurate. I mean, you can, but you're going to spend an enormous amount of money trying to defend these cases. And there's. There is only one scenario here, one and one only settlement. And what will happen is defendants will have to post a bond during the appeal process in order to cover the damages, because what, what the, what the court doesn't want to do is let the plaintiffs get screwed out of money during the appeals process, where the defendants just use all their capital to use for. For lawyers fees, and then they get nothing. So they'll have to post a bond. In other words, they got to come up with $1.78 million in assets in order to cover that damage portion. They're not going to be able to do that. I don't think that's realistic.

So one quick point. A couple people mentioned it in the chat. I've not read this. There's been an email from NAR to the membership saying that, yes, that's a big. I'm paraphrasing here, and I actually haven't read the email, but I've talked to folks who have. So this is what, third party information? But basically they said that they're going to try to chip away at the amount to get the amount of damages significantly reduced.

Yeah. For a settlement.

Yes, Correct. Which is really what James and I are saying. We're getting our. We're working our way there. That the first thing to understand is what James said is, okay, the settlement for the two folks that he mentioned before, they're out. They're done for this one. NAR took it to the mattresses. There's a Godfather reference for you. You're welcome. And lost. Okay, so now the next fight that they have is to try to lower the amount. We'll see what happens there. I think it's most likely that they will reduce the amount to what James is saying. The reason for that is because it doesn't help anyone. Well, it certainly doesn't help the plaintiff's attorneys if there's no one to get money from. And if you push the envelope too far on the the loser, then they don't have enough cash to win.

Correct.

So.

And just like a couple things, I'm sure there's a million comments going on here. I'm not going to read them all. NER is going to appeal. That's what you do. They're going to show strength. That's what you do. And they should. I'm not saying otherwise, but this is an important part. Everybody needs to understand. So 30 minutes after the jury came back with the verdict, the same plaintiff filed another class action suit. This is what Keith and I have been talking about called copycat suits. So they basically have proven the case against certain defendants. They've proven that it works in that market. But what about everybody else? So immediately at 1207pm they filed another suit, Catch Mark did, representing home sellers in the same area. It was filed against Compass Exp, Redfin Weikart, Realtors, United Real Estate, Howard Hahna and Douglas Elliman, including the national association of Realtors, by the way. That's just the beginning. So this is an extremely important part of what I'm explaining to everybody right now. They're going to file these suits. You'll probably see more suits filed in other markets where none of these cases have been filed yet. Like, I don't know, an example California, and they'll name everybody. NARA is going to be in a very difficult spot. Now then I think strategically they played their hand the way they needed to, but basically NAR has to settle these cases just like anywhere in REMAX did. And the way this will likely go, because what will happen here is all of these defendants, these additional defendants are going to be calling NAR and saying, we're not going to spend three years defending ourselves and all of this money you need to settle the case out. The reason why this is important is we can basically get this over with and not have to deal with massive amounts of litigation for a long period of time. So NAR will likely, now that they have lost. Unfortunately, by the way, we were never a proponent of them losing. I want to make sure our words were clear. We were just predicting what we thought would happen based upon the evidence, the testimony, which was really not good and sort of where we're at. But now NAR needs to settle these cases and they need to loop it up nationwide. What I mean by that is NAR needs to go to these. All of the plaintiffs in all of these cases, and they need to say, we're going to settle for some amount of money and we're going to loop the entire industry into the settlement. So everybody who's an NER member, as an example, gets to be covered in the settlement itself. And NAR will come up.

Say that part again, because I think that's a very important.

Everybody who's an NAR member. If NAR plays this the way that they would logically do it, if you're an NER member, you would be covered in the settlement. So anyone thinking about leaving ner, do not do that. That would be tactfully stupid. Like, you need to make sure you're part of the settlement. Cause if you've ever been sued. I have, and I've sued people. It's very expensive. So NAR is going to come up with. And by the way, this is speculation on the settlement I'm proposing. I'm not saying this is how it will go. This is just an example. They come up with a number, $2 billion over the course of four years. They do a dues assessment, and everybody pays some amount of money. You're now covered in the settlement. You're not having to go deal with potential clawbacks of compensation and everything else and it goes away. In addition, they open the class. Everybody gets covered. So it's a nationwide settlement. Every home seller during that timeframe gets covered in that settlement. And everybody gets a small amount of money through the, through the, through the class settlement. And that. That's how the industry moves forward. NAR will not have a choice here because five other major brokerages just got named. Imagine what happens if everybody else gets named in the process when you have one entity that they can deal with to come up with. An easy way to come up with that money is through nar, through a dues assessment. And they settle these cases out. That is way we think this will end up going. And I think you will see that happen within the next 30 days.

All right, couple things we probably should have led with this. Number one, neither James nor I are your broker of record or an attorney or. And neither James nor I are attorneys. So if you hear something and you go talk with your broker of record and your broker of record disagrees, listen to your broker of record.

Correct.

Maybe have them listen to our podcast. And then one of the other broker record, We're getting asked a lot of questions like, does this mean we're good forever? Look, the words like all, always and never are probably wrong. But the best and safest position you can be in is be inside one of the groups who settles and, or gets to the other side of this, right?

Yes. And let me add a comment to that. So I believe I'm a little hesitant on this. It's either a four or five year statute of limitation on these claims. I believe it's five. Yeah. So a little fuzzy today. So five year, five year statute of limitation on these claims. So if you're part of the settlement and it's part of a nationwide settlement, then in theory, yes, it's done and over with. Now, the way the class action settlements work is, and you've seen this, you get them in the mail once. All of a sudden you get a postcard in the mail and it's like, hey, you're part of a class. You bought a phone at this time frame and you're entitled to whatever amount of money. The way that settlements operate is you're, you're automatically added into the class and then you can remove yourself from the class if you don't want to be part of the settlement. The only reason that you would do that is if you wanted to go hire your own lawyers and create a different class or whatever to sue the same defendants. The problem with that is that the defendants will likely have already settled for everything that they can, and you'll be very hard pressed to find another lawyer to go sue the same defendants all over again because the lawyers know there's no money there to actually grab. So while it's to keys common, it's not a hundred percent certainty. You're pretty much covered if you join one of these settlements to, to get out of it, you'd be pretty much free in the. In the free in the free and clear. So.

All right, let me clear up a couple questions. One, I've been asked, which companies were in the copycat suit? I'll list them now, quickly. Compass Exp, Redfin, Howard Hanna, United Real Estate, Douglas Elliman and Weikert. Those folks were in the lawsuit that was just initiated today. Question about if you weren't with NAR for the full five years, maybe you were with a company that wasn't affiliated with nar. Would you be exposed? The answer is probably. But that usually, not always, but sometimes that means you're with a smaller broke. Look, these plaintiffs attorneys are going after the big Boys because the big boys have deep pockets. They aren't interested today in going after these smaller players that are in a space. Could you theoretically have some small local attorney that could come after you? Yeah, maybe. I think it's unlikely.

And keep in mind, Keith, it's likely that if you are a member of nara, regardless of the time frame, they will loop you into it because you keep in mind they're going to want to do a dues assessment on you as well.

Yeah. Question, if you're with someone who already settled, would you then have a dues assessment through nar? Number one answer is we're not sure. But our intuition is yes. They're going to assign the dues to every single person who wants to be a member of nar. I want to say this again because I understand that the knee jerk reaction, the feeling, it feels really good to say f nar, I'm out of here. I'm not paying any more dues and I'm certainly not paying a special assessment. We are telling anyone who will listen that would be a mistake. Even if you're already covered because you happen to be with a brand that already settled. Look, I, I, I, we're, I'm, I could say negative things about NAR if I wanted to. It's not hard. Right. But there are things that NAR does very well. The political action committee for NAR is a powerful lobbying organization that has that too. Yeah. It has protected this industry for years. There is, they, they do a bunch of things wrong. They also do a lot of things right.

Yeah. And we're going to cover why this is important in just a minute.

So we got some questions on. We'll talk about how to prepare at the end. We'll talk about our thoughts on how to prepare. I'm doing my best with the questions. There are a lot of you and two of us.

Let me, let me, you go do that and I'll continue forward here so we can sort of talk about some of this stuff. So don't leave nar. NAR actually needs the support of its members more than ever and it's going to be to your benefit. And I realized to Keith's comment, there's lots of things NARA has not done well recently. We don't need to have a, a, you know, webinar on that. But there's a lot of things they're going to be need, they're going to need to do, starting with the fact that NARA is going to need the membership to settle this case out. They're Going to need the members to be part of it in order to get the amount that the plaintiffs will agree to and we can get everybody out of this mess on a go forward basis. I'm going to explain to you how this is likely going to be structured going forward. Number two is ner, which I'm sure somebody here will be listening to at some point, needs to make it a priority, which I believe has already been started to be worked on, but if not, needs to make it a priority on working with Fannie and Freddie to allow buyer's agent compensation to be financed in the loan. This is part of our go forward strategy that we're going to talk about. By the way, what I want to make sure everybody hears from is we're the stuff we're talking about is not just us. It's talking with industry lawyers. It's talking with, you know, very high level people in the industry behind the scenes. This is kind of a structure on the way the industry will operate going forward. The very first thing you all need to understand is the MLS structure is likely going to change. So this is what the future looks like. You're going to see at some point in time. And the offer of compensation in the MLS is going to be removed. So what I mean by that is an MLS will be about cooperation. It will be about data, be about rules on how we use that data. It'll be about security of that data. It's going to be all the things the MLS does. What you're going to see a change is that there's going to be no more offer of compensation. The mls. Now I want to get this clear because everybody gets this confused. We already had it so that you could put a penny or a dollar in the MLS as the minimum amount of compensation offered to a buyer's agent when representing a seller. That was then. Now MLS are going to optional, which would be zero. So we can put zero in there. I want to be clear with my words, you're going to see it where that is likely gone, that there is no offer of compensation being put into the multiple listing service. Not only are the cases that we're now seeing play out, the plaintiffs want that to change within the mls. The judges in these cases have already indicated that they want to see further changes. And more importantly, the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission are watching these cases. And the DOJ intervened in the recent settlement in no select, which is the case out of Maryland where the first case started to settle out. The terms of those that settlement were not agreed to by the Department of Justice because, quote, it didn't go far enough. And they referenced Northwest MLS and MLS Penn as the two. MLS is where compensation was allowed to be zero and it didn't make any structural changes to the way our industry operates. So they're literally using the two examples and how the industry has been moving towards adoption as the reason why it's not enough. So I want to be very clear about this. These cases are being watched by the government agencies. If they don't end up being the way that they want, both. The Federal Trade Commission has complete authority based upon an executive order instituted by President Biden in 2021. This is not a political statement. This is a fact. You can look it up where the commissioner has complete authority to go in and rewrite the rules in residential real estate to remove what it classifies as tying. Essentially, you know, you're. You're paying. You're paying for two services at the same time. The DOJ has already intervened on the settlement and has stated that the current terms that are being proposed are not far enough for what they want to see. Now, they haven't said what they want, but all of us who are following it know that what they're referring to theoretically is compensation being removed in the mls. So what's important here is to understand the way that this is likely going to change. And this is where some of these things come across. Number one, some of the stuff that was done in the current settlements that were agreed upon in no select, the other case we're talking about, Burnett today, no select is another one, and Morell's the third. So some of these things that were done with anywhere in ReMax, you can expect these same things to be done nationally. We don't have all these details, but you can expect this to occur. Number one is there's going to be no requirement to join NER or follow the code of ethics. You'll see that from a franchisor perspective, and certainly you might see this down at the brokerage level. No requirements to make or accept offers. There'll be a disclosure to home sellers that offers are not set, that both the compensation to the seller's agent is negotiable. You're going to see this instituted as well, most likely through these cases, and that you do not, that the seller does not have to offer compensation to the buyer's agent. So these are things to expect in some of these changes. There'll be no filtering of compensation in the mls, which shouldn't be there anyway, to Begin with. And then there'll also be new rules and things that companies will follow advising agents to show properties regardless of any offer of compensation, and certainly no minimum compensation requirements as well as you will not be able to advertise your services as free. A lot of these things we're already doing a lot of these things we should be doing. So I'm not necessarily against some of these. Some of this stuff is certainly some changes from a disclosure perspective. I think you can expect a lot of this to occur on a national basis. Also, I use this as a reference just for context when people start hearing this and freaking out when Dodd Frank was enacted. For those of you who are around at that time frame, I'm dating myself now. Back in 2008 through 2010, you know, the whole mortgage industry was thought to be completely, you know, gone and there would be no more mortgage brokers. And all of these rules were put in place for disclosures on consumers when taking out a loan. The industry adapted. We have all those disclosures explaining compensation. We have all that stuff in place now. And consumers continue to pay for these services. So I want you to think about this. When you hear some of this stuff that's likely to come down. We're going to be able to learn how to articulate our value better than we have. And consumers have shown that they're willing to pay for these services. I'm going to stop there, Keith. I got a lot more to cover, but I'm sure that there are questions they want to a bunch.

This has come up a few times. So I just want to handle this. Been asked about the VA because the way the rules are currently written for a VA borrower not allowed to pay representation. Right, I get that. That's how it's written today.

This is why you want nar.

This is why you want nar. That will change. Now listen, let's also back up a step because I've seen several comments about the Wild Wild west and this is going to be chaos. Everybody take a breath. Okay, Everybody relax. Relax. This is not going to, in our opinion, completely implode by our representation at all that we have in the US the best form of residential real estate advocacy for a buyer and a seller. Better than anywhere else that I have looked at or we have researched. This isn't ending buyer agency. I'll say it one more time, this is not ending buyer agency. What has not happened in the past is buyer's agents haven't clearly articulated how they get paid. And now you will have something probably A buyer broker agreement or some version of it, that you will have to have a conversation with the buyer about how you get paid and that they will be responsible if no one else will. Someday, might we be able to roll it into the mortgage? Perhaps we will have to go through the process of changing that. It will take time. Is there anything that precludes a seller from offering to pay the buyer's agent's commission? No. A seller can continue to do it the quote, unquote old way if they want to.

They can be unconstitutional to stop them from doing that.

Correct. So, for example, we're going to get into more detail on this later, but I think personally in the entry level price point, what you are going to see is almost no change to all of the comments about my buyers can't afford it. What are they going to do? Oh my God. This is the end of the for the first time home buyer, if I were listing an entry level price point home today, I would offer the buyer's agent a commission because I know the buyer of my home doesn't have that money.

And so you mean you as the seller would offer that?

Correct. Myself as the seller, if I was lit, if I was putting my home on the market and it was an entry level price point home, you will see very little change to how it works as you move up in price point. Sure. Could you see some change? Yeah, probably. We're going to talk more about that later. But I just, I know this is scary news. I know if this is the first time you're looking at it, it sounds like it's the end of the world. We've been paying very close attention to this for months. We've been doing webinars and podcasts and talking to anyone who will listen. We do not believe that this is the end of the world for buyer's agency.

Yeah. I'm going to add a few comments here that I think are really important for everybody to do. For those of you that know me, I like to do a lot of research and just bury my head in this stuff. It drives Keith nuts and he falls asleep, but it interests me. Yeah. So number one is this is some interesting stats for you to think about. So in 2001, the use of a realtor on the buy side of a transaction was 69% of the time. Today it's about 88% of the time. In 2001, Zillow didn't exist. We didn't have any of this tech or portals or all this data online. And everybody over the Past umpteen years has talked about how the realtor was going to be removed with the advent of all this technology. It's all bullshit. And the reason I say that bluntly is the use of a realtor has gone up because the complications of these transactions are getting more and more sophisticated. There's so much to decipher in it. And remember this, this is extremely important, what I'm about to tell you. This is an infrequent transaction that people do two to three times in their life. That is it. It is the single most expensive thing most Americans will, will pay to do in their life. They want representation. Some other stats that are important. 1960 dual income households was 30%. Today it's between 60 and 70%. So mom and dad, who have a kid, me, don't wake up and go, we need to sell our house. Let's go take all this on our own. When mom has a career, dad has a career. We need people to help us through this process. So this whole concept of buyer representation is going to go away is just absurd to me. Every study I've seen shows that consumers are willing to pay for it. They find that most agents, as another stat, would use their Same realtor again, 90% say they would do that. Most people find their realtor through referral because they like the person they worked with. We just have to learn how to articulate value. That's what we're talking about here. So the process that Keith said and this is we'll kind of dive into this a little bit in the world what we're looking at moving into. And this is a takeaway for brokerages and agents right now. This is what you should be doing. Number one, you need to learn how to talk to a seller in a post lawsuit world where this, where compensation in the MLS is gone to explain to the seller that it is extremely important, Mr. And Mrs. Seller, that you understand how things used to operate and how things operate today. To Keith's comment, you are likely going to receive an offer and in that offer you're going to have a stipulation to pay the buyer's agent's compensation. That buyer is probably strapped for cash because you've benefited from, you know, massive rise in appreciation on your property. And it's hard for buyers to afford anything at 8% interest rates. So you need to understand that that buyer likely cannot pay the compensation to their buyer's agent and that you'll need to come up with that cash in order to close the deal. It's a choice you get to make. But just want to be clear, if you don't, the deal will likely fall apart. I don't think a seller in today's market or any market is going to walk away from a transaction over some amount of compensation that needs to be paid to get the deal done. Number two, to back up this support, you look at the FSBO market today. 8 to 10% of properties in the United States are done via FSBO. 50% of those are done between neighbors and families. So I kind of remove that from the equation, which means 4 to 5% of those are done with actually going out on the open market to try and find a buyer. Having surveyed our own members in our company, when a member goes and represents a buyer and writes an offer on that FSBO property, the seller almost always says, I'm not going to pay your compensation. And the agent goes, okay, well, that's fine. We don't have a deal. And what do you think the seller does? 90 times out of 10, they come up with the money and pay the agent and the deal closes. So my point here is, and what Keith's getting at is we're going to simply shift. Here's the way this will likely go. The buyer's agent will have, at some point in time, I'm very confident NAR will make this happen. The ability to finance the compensation in the loan, that's option A. I think that will be the minority of the. Of the choices. Option B, write a stipulation in the contract that the sellers. The sellers to pay the buyer's agent directly. There's the second option. The third option is buyers to offer a credit to, I'm sorry, the sellers to offer a credit to the buyer. Buyer's then able to compensate their agent. There's going to be some variation of these, and I know that some states won't do this. And there's lots of rules. You're going to see some way that we're maneuvering it. But what the government is specifically looking for and what plaintiffs want is to see a buyer's agent represented buyer and a seller's agent represented seller. The buyer's agent's essentially being paid by the buyer and the seller's agent's being paid by the seller. They don't want to see money routing from the seller's agent and then over to the buyer's agent. Remove. That becomes a negotiation tactic. We move forward. This is all about a buyer representation agreement with the buyer explaining what you do. To be clear, 12 states currently require this. I would encourage every association in the United States that's a state level association to work legislatively right now on getting buyer broker representation agreements mandated at the state level. It has benefits and the government's likely not going to fight you. You're establishing fiduciary with that buyer. You're telling them what you're going to do in the terms and what you're going to do it for. You're also benefiting you and you're benefiting the seller. Because Looky lose aren't going through that property any further. It's not just people who are just wanting to look at real estate on a weekend. They're working with an agent to buy that property. 12 states do it, 38 other states should do it as well. You do that, you level the playing field. Then it's simply a matter of who is going to compensate the buyer's agent. And as Keith just referenced, there's nothing prohibiting a seller from still offering a bonus or compensation or any of that. There'll simply be a disclosure in place, we explain, and then the seller can choose what they want to do and it becomes a negotiation tactic actor after Keith, I'll stop there for any other comments or questions.

There's a lot. Let me try to unpack some of these.

Oh my God. I just looked in the chat and you're right.

Yeah, it's, it's, it's understandably chaotic. I think just to reinforce what you said. Look, I want to say this again because I feel it. I feel the energy in the chat. Like this is really scary. Understandable. When things like $1.7 billion start getting tossed around, we can't help but get a little nervous. For the most part, buyers and sellers are happy with the experience that they've had with their real estate agent. Are we going to have some new documentation? Yes. I think maybe, James, maybe we should talk about the three things that people should prepare for. Right. The most important, like what to do. And then we can backfill with some of the specific questions.

So first thing is go. For those of you who are in the 12 states that require your buyer broker representation agreement, you're already familiar with it. I'm explaining to you. For everybody else who doesn't have one, go download it. You have one, your state has one, it's guaranteed you have one. If not, you can certainly ask other people. I'd be surprised, but what ones they're using. And you need to get very comfortable with that. And just think of it like this. This is A psychology thing. It's just. Yeah, whoever just put that, flip the script. It's like, how would you talk to a seller? Would you take a listing without having a listing agreement? No. Who would do that? Well, the reality is, all of you on this webinar, you work with buyers and you all know working with a buyer is actually more work than working with a seller. Yet if you didn't have a representation agreement, why, what's the reason why you wouldn't ask somebody to pay you for your time? So you need to get in a psychological spot of being like, damn it, like, I'm worth what I'm asking you to pay me. And you need to get comfortable with that. The second thing, buyer presentation. So I'm assuming everybody here would go on a listing appointment with a presentation to articulate your services and what you're going to spend your money on and what you're going to do. And all of the stuff that you do as an agent will do the same thing with buyers. Explain to them how much time it takes when you have to read disclosures. And for those of you in California, you know what I mean? When there are 126 pages, like, there's work involved in all of this stuff. Setting up appointments, meeting with the home inspector, touring properties that you might want to view, calling the agent, getting that disclosure pack. All of this stuff is things that you do. Get really comfortable explaining the sophistication of what buying a home is. It's not just, we open house, we open doors and let somebody look at it. There's way more in that process. NAR did a great thing. There's 179 things they put together on a document that you. It was 179 things an average buyer's agent does on a transaction. Just look it up on Google and we'll put it. We can put it in the notes or something, but you can get. Great. Download it. Get used to talking about that. Because when a buyer hears all the things that you do, they go, wow, I didn't realize that. You know why they didn't realize that? Because we've sucked as an industry articulating our value to buyers. We didn't have to, well, guess what? Now we do. And you know what else? We're going to be better because of it. We're going to be better at articulating what we do. I want to make a third comment that I think people miss. And this is like, for those of you that are big producers and who want to be, you'll appreciate this comment. I don't even like the idea that the seller's agent was dictating what my compensation was going to be when representing a buyer anyway. See, I think this is going to have a reverse effect, and I'm willing to go bold on this. And you guys can quote me and, you know, say I'm wrong later, but I'm confident I'm going to be right. I'll bet you good agents will sit down with a buyer in time and they'll say, I'm worth whatever, and it's more than what they were being paid to begin with. I actually think compensation will go up for good people that can articulate value. And we just had the chains freed to do it. So the plaintiff's lawyers, while they think they're doing a service, they're idiots in many ways. Like, this is a money grab. To some extent. This is going to change the industry. But I think professional agents will get better, and I think that buyers will be willing to pay good agents to do good service for them. That is different than what, Candidly, a seller's agent could only negotiate with the seller. So I actually see some of this is like, hallelujah, let me go. Let me go. Dictate what I want it, what I want to make, and what I'm worth in the market. So I think it's another way to think of it.

Yeah. The point to that is really your buyer presentation of tomorrow better look very, very different of your buyer presentation or consultation of yesterday. Right. Historically, what we've done is we sit in a conference room, we do a visioneering exercise, we talk to them, you know, tell me what you want in the house. And it's a little more fluffy. Right. You better get real grounded and talk about how you're differentiated, how you provide value and really go into how you are different.

Yeah.

And that. And. And then you're also going to have to explain what you charge and how much you make. And by the way, that's how it.

Should have been all agreed.

Right. Like, it's a little weird that we had a fiduciary. Google it if you want to, but we had a fiduciary obligation, but we weren't explaining to people how we got paid or what we did. So I think the future will be your buyer consultation will have to level up your buyer consult. And I see the comments in the chat like, we can't negotiate an offer of contract. I know you can't today. That's going to change based off this lawsuit. This lawsuit will now mean you have to negotiate an offer of contract. You will have to use a buyer broker agreement. I think every state in the US Has a buyer broker agreement. It's just not used in every state. You're going to have to get comfortable with the buyer broker agreement. You're going to have to articulate value, and you're going to have to get better at negotiation.

Abr, by the way, go get abr. Like this is another one you should be doing. This is where to me you sit down on a presentation with a buyer and say they're now interviewing a couple agents because they have to sign a buyer broker agreement. Well, I want to interview some people. Great. Do it. I want you to. Here's what makes me different. Here's my.