SB 331, state legislation that would make sweeping changes to the Alabama Real Estate Commission, will be considered by the Alabama House of Representatives. As of March 19th, it was voted out of the committee and placed on the legislative calendar.
UPDATE 3/26: According to the Alabama Association of REALTORS® there will be an amendment to SB 331/ HB 553 to be sure that it is clear that one of the nine seats will continue to be a dedicated seat for an African American member.
Please review the potential changes below as well as AAR’s FAQ regarding SB331.
- Provides further definitions for people exempt from regulation
- Authorizes commission to provide live virtual online education courses and content for prelicense, post license, and CE
- Allows for one-hour CE courses and limits hours earned in any one day to a maximum of 9 hours.
- Requires students attend entire course before being awarded CE credit and prohibits instructor/school from issuing credit if a course is not complete.
- Allows instructors to take a10 min break after each 50 minutes of instruction
- Revise method of appointing members to commission. (p14-18)
- Removes language specifying appointments are provided by the governing body of the Alabama Professional Real Estate Society or trade association, and rather the Alabama Association of Realtors. 8/9 must be licensed as a broker or salesperson for 10 years before appointment. One seat is reserved for a consumer.
- Updates interim appointment protocol
- REMOVES the provision reserving one Commission seat be reserved for a Black member who meets all other requirements.
- Prohibit commission from engaging in political activity, hiring lobbyists, engaging in political speech or activity prohibited by law (p20-21)
- Require commission to publish the names of any financial institutions holding commission funds on the commission website (p23)
- Provide further qualifications for licensure of brokers and salespersons, including temporary qualifying brokers and those transferring from other states (p28-30)
- Renewal of active salesperson and brokers licenses must include 15 hours of CE including commission approved risk management course, fair housing courses, and ethics course.
- If license payment is declined or rejected, the license will be inactive until licensee pays In full as well as a penalty fee
- Bill expands the definitions of who is exempted from licensure with regards to property management