Today, the New Jersey Senate Commerce Committee approved two bills, which could have a profound effect on our business.

The first creates a mandatory requirement for continuing education for real estate brokers, broker-salespersons and salespersons.

If signed into law, the bill will require up to 16 hours of continuing education before a real estate license can be renewed. This in and of itself cannot be bad unless the course work is irrelevant gimmes.

I’m a firm believer in a challenging continuing education system as a means of avoiding mental calcification and I can think of a realtor or two that could benefit from some computer skills, ethics, or simple manners, but I digress.

The second bill would allow brokers to offer rebates to home buyers and require those rebates to be documented in a contract at the beginning of a brokerage relationship or in a buyer agency agreement.

This one I’m much more on the fence over as it sets the stage for rebates to be offered for in-house listings only (and only sometimes). If a broker offers a home buyer a rebate because they have both sides of the transaction and don’t have to split the commission, would that create even more incentive to only show those homes? Does this further set the stage for unscrupulous agents to only show other office’s dogs and their very own darlings? While these incentives exist today, does this legislation ratchet them up even more? How are consumers protected if they don’t have full visibility to what is available?

These legislations must be approved by the full state senate before they go to the governor’s desk.

Love ‘em or hate them, call your legislators.