If you haven’t seen the headlines over on Inman News, this has been a terrible week for NAR. In the so-called “bombshell lawsuit” that seeks to stop listing agents from cooperating with and sharing commissions with the buyer’s agents, a judge certified the class. This means the suit can now move forward. NAR, the four top brokerages in the country, and a number of Missouri MLSs were named as defendants. This week’s RealClues contains a deep dive into that topic.

There were two other pieces of bad news this week for NAR. The pocket listing MLS lawsuit that was dismissed by a lower court, was reinstated in the appellate court.

The most important issue, however, is that NAR’s Clear Cooperation Policy (CCP) is now being accused of violating the Sherman Anti-Trust Act. This is being pursued by the Department of Justice. At stake is whether listing agents will be able to share commissions with buyers’ agents in the future. I’ll be doing a deep dive into these two topics next week.

The good news is that there’s no need to panic yet about the litigation. That can drag out for years.

The issue with the DOJ is something else entirely. My sources say the DOJ’s ultimate goal is to make buyers pay their portion of the commission. The question is whether achieving that goal will result in the elimination of the MLS. If that were to happen, it would be a cataclysmic event for the entire industry.

Couple these developments with the drops in the stock market, the increasing interest rates, the inflation, and the Russian invasion of the Ukraine, and we have all the makings for a major market slowdown.

No matter what happens, the industry always moves forward. We’ll be here to help you weather whatever lies ahead.