Disclosures in MLS

Listor & Seller/Owner Disclosures in the MLS

In our HIS Bulletin of January 17, 2008, we announced a rule change that the listor is seller/owner disclosure should be in the listing record Private Remarks instead of the in Public Remarks effective February 1, 2008. The publication of this change gave rise to questions from several participants and subscribers about other listor and seller/owner disclosures. Following is a list of the disclosures that are required by MLS HAWAII, INC. dba Hawaii Information Service (“MLS”), the Hawaii Administrative Rules, Title 16, Chapter 99, Real Estate Brokers and Salespersons (“HAR”) and/or the National Association of REALTORS® Code of Ethics (“NAR”). Please note that this list addresses the disclosures that regard listors or sellers/owners that may be required in advertising or listing records, and is not the complete list of all disclosures required by HAR, NAR and MLS.

License Status of Listor or Listing Agent/Broker
-Required by HAR and NAR in all advertising to prevent agents from advertising “For Sale by Owner”. NAR requires that REALTORS® disclose their REALTOR® status or as licensee. (Refer to HAR §16-99-11 and NAR Code of Ethics Article 12 to see all information required to be included in all advertising.)

-Not required by MLS in the listing record itself. Listor should have his/her license status displayed on his web pages in the HIS Public Site (or on their personal websites) as required by the HAR & NAR. (Note: It is assumed that listor has an active license by virtue of his/her being able to access the MLS and his ability to submit listings to the service. MLS is only available to participants and subscribers who have active licenses to sell real estate in Hawaii.)

License Status of Seller/Owner (who is not Listor)
– Required by HAR in all advertising.
– Not addressed by NAR.
– Currently not required by MLS, but will be required upon approval of amendment to the MLS rules in the listing record Public Remarks.
– Examples: “Seller/owner has active (or inactive) license to sell real estate in the State of Hawaii.”
“Seller/owner is licensed to sell real estate in the State of Hawaii.”

Listor is seller/owner
– Required by HAR & NAR. This disclosure is not listed under the HAR section regarding what must appear in all advertising. As per the HAR, Listor must provide this disclosure in writing to the prospective buyer and buyer’s agent/broker prior to acceptance of an offer. As per the NAR, this disclosure should be in writing prior to the signing of any contract.
– Required by MLS in the Private Remarks. Inclusion of this disclosure in the listing Public Remarks does not fulfill the HAR and NAR requirement of written disclosure to prospective buyers and their agents/brokers.
– Examples: “Listor is seller.” “Listor is owner.” “Listor is part seller/owner.” “Listor has ownership interested in the listed property.”

Listor is related to seller
– Required by HAR & NAR. This disclosure is not listed under the HAR section regarding what must appear in all advertising.
– As per the HAR, Listor must provide this disclosure in writing to the prospective buyer and buyer’s agent/broker prior to acceptance of an offer.
– As per NAR, this disclosure should be in writing to the prospective buyer and buyer’s agent/broker prior to the signing of any contract. Note: NAR consider “in-laws” members of the immediate family. In a situation where the need to disclose is questionable, full disclosure is preferable to avoid any possible appearance of impropriety.
– Not required by MLS at this time, but MLS has been asking listors to provide this disclosure in the listing record

Private Remarks. Plans are to amend the rules so that this will be a required listing element.
– Examples: “Listor is related to seller.” “Listor is related to owner.” “Listor is a business affiliate of seller/owner.” “Listor and seller belong to the same brokerage firm.”

Listing co-listed with another broker (Co-listor disclosure)– Not addressed or required by HAR or NAR.
– Currently required by MLS in the listing record Private Remarks. However, there are plans to amend the rules to eliminate this as a required listing element, because co-listor information can be entered on the listing input form.

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Should you have any questions or concerns, please send an email to Diana Haraguchi, Exec. Asst., to diana@hawaiiinformation.com or call 1-800-628-3121, enter # and then 172. Mahalo.

Diana Haraguchi

Hot Topics in Industry News

Want to keep your clients up to date on today’s hottest industry news? Drop them an e-mail with links to the following articles and your take on what this means to you and your clients, or use these stories to inspire a great blog entry this week.

Mortgage Rates Lowest Since 2005– Rates on 30-year mortgages dropped for a third straight week to the lowest level since the summer of 2005 as worries intensified about the current economic slowdown.

Freddie Mac, the mortgage company, reported Thursday that 30-year, fixed-rate mortgages averaged 5.69 percent this week.

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Not your average housing bubble-Normally when analysts and economists talk about housing bubbles, they’re talking about price points: steep increases followed by steep declines.

A recent article published by the Journal of American Planning Association (hat tip to WSJ’s Development Blog) examines what it calls a “generational housing bubble” that the authors say could wreak havoc on the housing stock when baby boomers shift out of home buying mode and mainly into home selling mode.

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Anatomy of a Panic-The global financial markets have just begun to recover from a financial panic that has driven some 43 stock markets around the world down over 20 percent a piece from their most recent all-time highs. In the parlance of the financial world, that means that there are 43 “bear markets” in stocks occurring simultaneously around the planet, including a bear market that’s mauling Wall Street.

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Blog Update by Beth Berry
Director of Sales, Marketing, and Communications
beth@alohaliving.com

List Your Open Houses

Are you listing your open houses in REsearch so that your fellow agents can find them, and also market them to their prospects? Whenever you schedule an open house, add it to your REsearch calendar, just like you are adding an appointment. Then your open house will be searchable in the MLS, and can be mapped using REsearch’s mapping feature.

The more open house data we have in the database, the more we can do to help you market your properties and your open houses. Future plans for the open house feature include an Open House map on AlohaLiving.com, and future print publications. So, get those open house listings added to your calendar today!

How to Create an Open House
Login to REsearch
Click on the “Calendar” tab to begin.

The right side of the page has the “Enter New Appointment” function. Use the drop-down menu to select Open House.

Fill in the required information. The “With Whom” field will search your contacts and fill in the required information. Or you can add any name.

Type in the date and select a time, specifying the duration of the Open House.

Indicate whether you want this appointment to be recurring or if you want to be reminded via email or when you log in to REsearch.

Click the Save button when you are finished.

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Blog Update by Beth Berry
Director of Sales, Marketing, and Communications
beth@alohaliving.com

HIS Digest – January 17, 2008

Coming Soon!

We are still testing these enhancements and are hoping to release them for your use next week. We’ll keep you posted!

Spell check in forms and remarks. Look for the Spell Check button. Click on it after you complete your data entry.

Marketing Statistics by Quarter in addition to the month and year.

Fax number (office and agent) in the brochure format

RULES CHANGE

Listor-Owner Disclosure Now Required in the Private Remarks

A disclosure is required in the listing record if listor has an ownership interest in the listed property. This disclosure was required in the Public Remarks. On December 13, 2007, the HIS Board of Directors approved an amendment to the rules to require that the listor-owner/seller disclosure be in the Private Remarks instead. Everyone who has listings that currently have listor-owner disclosures in the Public Remarks shall have until February 1, 2008 to move the listor-owner disclosures to the Private Remarks. After that date, notices will be sent to all listors who have failed to do so.

Please note that it is a violation of the rules now, should a listor have ownership interest in a listed property and he/she does not have this disclosure in the listing record in the Public or Private Remarks at all.

Current processing fees for violation of of this rule is $25 per listing for the the first instance and then $50 per listing for each subsequent instance. HIS also reserves the right to withdraw or delete any listing that is in violation of the rules.

We understand that there may be confusion in regards to this change. Should you have any questions, please feel free to contact Diana Haraguchi, Exec. Asst. to the Pres/CEO at 1-800-628-3121, enter # and then 172, or send an email to diana@hawaiiinformation.com.

RULES REMINDER!
CONTACT INFO IN THE PUBLIC REMARKS

This is still the most reported violation. The following is not permitted in the Public Remarks.

– Mention of or reference to listor, listing agent, seller, owner or of any other person or entity affiliated or associated with them. (Exception is the disclosure that seller/owner has an active license to sell real estate in the State of Hawaii.)

– Contact info for listor, seller, owner or for any other person or entity affiliated or associated with them. This includes phone numbers, website or url addresses, location addresses or directions to the listed properties. This information is appropriate in the Private Remarks for the buyers’ brokers/agents’ benefit and information.

– Promotional, marketing, or advertising messages or info for the benefit of any entity.

– Any verbiage inviting or enticing the public site visitor to contact listor, seller or any entity or to visit the listed property. (Examples of verbiage not permitted are, “Call today.” “Call for information/showing.” “Call for map.” “Call for directions.” “Visit us today.”, “Come see this property now.”, etc.) In general, the inclusion of the words “call”, “contact”, and many pronouns (eg. “I”, “me”, “my”, “we”, “our”, “us”, etc.) in the Public Remarks will subject a listing to audit.

One of the main reasons that the above information is not permitted is that the Public Remarks are included in the brochures and info that are generated for prospective buyers. Information that may facilitate the buyers’ direct contact with the listor or seller, or visit of the listed properties on their own is not appreciated by the buyers’ brokers/agents.

HIS will, but is not obligated to send listors notices for any violations. Processing fees for this type of violation is $25 per listing for the first instance, and $50 per listing for every instance thereafter. Further, HIS reserves the right to withdraw or delete any listing that it deems in violation of the rules.

Maintenance Alert
Thursday, January 24, 2008, 9:00 a.m.

We are planning to do server maintenance work on Thursday, January 24, 2008, starting from 9:00 a.m. over a period of 4 to 5 hours. This will involve the intermittent rebooting of one of our servers that will interrupt access to the BOC (Bureau of Conveyances) documents for just a few minutes each time. We will send out an announcement confirming this work early next week. We appreciate your patience and apologize for any inconvenience this work may cause you. Should you have any questions, please feel free to call us.

Administration Notes

Normal Office Hours
Monday – Friday: 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m

In the event of emergency, you may leave a message in our emergency voice mailbox by calling the main office number and pressing * (star). Leave your message and our phone system will notify our on-call staff that there is an emergency message. Call 1-800-628-3121, if calling from the neighbor islands or 599-4224, if calling from Oahu.

Contact Information:
Sales & Marketing
Ann McCarty, Big Island and Kauai Sales Representative
Phone: 1-800-628-3121, enter # and then 157
Email: Ann@AlohaLiving.com
Colleen Yasuhara, Oahu and Maui Sales Representative
Phone: Oahu – 599-4224, enter # and then 151
Maui – 1-800-628-3121, enter # and then 151
Email: Colleen@AlohaLiving.com

Tech Support
Phone: Oahu – 599-4224
Neighbor Islands: 1-800-628-3121
Email: TechSupport@HawaiiInformation.com

Accounting:
Phone: Oahu – 599-4224
Neighbor Islands: 1-800-628-3121
Email: Accounting@HawaiiInformation.com

Data Quality & Control:
Phone: Oahu – 599-4224, enter # and then 166
Neighbor Islands: 1-800-628-3121, enter # and then 166
Email: CustSvc_Data_Discrepancy@HawaiiInformation.com

Administration:
Diana Haraguchi, Exec. Asst. to the President/CEO
Phone: Oahu – 599-4224, enter # and then 172
Neighbor Islands: 1-800-628-3121, enter # and then 172
Email: Diana@HawaiiInformation.com

www.HawaiiInformation.com
Dole Office Building, 680 Iwilei Road #777, Honolulu, HI 96817