Sign South Carolina Travel Agency Agreement Secure

Document type sign travel agency agreement south carolina secure

okay we're gonna go against our appreciate everyone for being here um this is gonna be our forms webinar going over the changes that will take effect January 1st um today we're gonna go over the main contract the buyer agency agreement the listening agreement and then at the end we're going to cover a recent change but to an LR form um and a few of the other addendums so the best way to find our forms are currently in the dry forms is just go to our scr website se Realtors org backslash forms and then hit on the this link here where it says click to view drafts of upcoming forms on when you click that link there'll be the buyer agency will be here the listing agreement and then the normal contract so once again all these changes we effective January 1st it will not be available in non draft form prior to January 1st but starting January 1st wherever you currently get your forms whether it be through our website doubt loop DocuSign zip forms they should be there so the way that the forms were changes were made is we have a forms committee which consists of eight members of the Association these are practicing members of the Association this is not just a group of attorneys and in Columbia these are all practicing members of the Association who sat down and went through all the as if weren't for download data and said hey which one of our forms are being used the most and it came about seventy percent of all of our downloads were either for the contract the buyers you see or the listing agreement so the committee said let's really focus on those three forms this year strengthen kind of our foundational documents before moving out to other addendums and also trying to keep the changes to as few forms as possible um so the easiest way to be able to tell January first whether or not you're using the new contract is to look at this very top part right here about the parties be our solely responsible for retain legal advice prior to signing of the contract this used to be right before the signature line of the contract in fact when I would recommend to people when they were asking how should I go over the contract with my you know client I would always tell them hey go ahead and start at the back I tell them hey this is a legal document if you need any legal advice feel free to get it I'm gonna explain this point to is a real estate licensee but if you need the additional two that you need legal counsel but we have now added that to the very front of the contract so that would be the first thing that you will cover with your client or customer the exchange we made to paragraph one is that you see that the definition of business days is no longer there the business days have been completely deleted from this draft and starting January 1st business days will no longer exist in any of our contracts so any addendums or that you have that use currently that have the term business days in them that will be replaced by calendar days all the contract will now either have calendar days or a hard date there will be no more business days on the reason for that is is that we had members across the state found business days a little bit too cumbersome it was hard to figure out the calculation so everyone sort of understands what the calendar day or hard date is so we chain made those changes the next thing I want to point out is not a change but something that has come up recently the Commission so I want to make a quick note of it on this line here about virus odors a South Carolina real estate licensee two cases came from the Commission this year one involved a buyer one involved a seller both of which were South Carroll real estate licensees they failed to check the box on this first page but instead wrote it on the last page of the contract made the disclosure an agent remarks on the MLS and it had previously dealt with the end with the licensee on the other side so it didn't feel like they needed to necessarily make that overt of a disclosure um the Commission had could they heard this complaint something had this transaction that cause someone to file a complaint there was testimony given that nobody was deceived no one was mislead but because the wall' requires that that disclosure should be bold underlying capital letters on the first page of the contract and they failed to check the box both individuals were found guilty of the license law violation so reminder that if you yourself are buying property or if you're representing a buyer or seller who is a South Carroll state licensee make sure you check the box or make that disclosure on the first page of the contract because you make it elsewhere it does not count if you didn't do it the right place the next thing we added is in highlighted in yellow so I do want to point out that anything that you see in the yellow is our highlighted changes or if it's in red red language or red type that also means it was added let's are in January first all the highlights in red will go away so there will be no more indicator of what is new so make sure that you have saved this video as a reference so south from a license allow requires that Julie make had that the buyer and seller acknowledge that they received the disclosure of brokerage relationship in the contract so we've added that disclosure to the first page make sure that of course that they initial that they will also say whether or not they received client or customer service on we are getting rid of the page eight of the contract that you currently have and I'm replacing it with this disc partially with this disclosure so if you have a buyer and you have signed an inclusive right to buy or an exclusive right to buyer's agency they will check the client box if you've not signed one of those two documents then it will check the customer box same thing with the seller if you have an exclusive right to sell or an exclusive right to a seller's agency then you will check the client they will check the client box otherwise will be the customer box so make sure that you're doing that appropriately reminder that this disclosure or brokerage relationship forms needs to be done at the point of first substantive contact with an individual so you need to either give that to have a physical copy that you can hand for them to look over them if possible get them to Tucson that they know is receipt or add it to your email signature and then simply send it to them as an email that will also satisfy the requirement under the wall those are the only change other changes we made to the first page of the contract the next change we made is to paragraph four on we've gotten rid of the automatic extension um across the state that was sort of misused or miss art dependent on which side of the transaction you represented whether or not you believe that an automatic extension are applied or not so the easiest so the easiest example is that a buyer waits until a few days prior to closing to change their lender so they can get a slightly lower rate as a result the lender is not able to meet the previously agreed upon closing date and instead needs to close five six days later which may or may not fall inside that automatic extension now our current language says an automatic extension through no fault on satisfied contingency through no fault to be there party and the buyer will argue that hey it's not my fault that we're not closing a time is the banks and the seller will go where the only reason they Bank is important this new bank is involved just because you wait until five six days before the closing to change lenders so now anytime the closing date needs to be changed is going to require both parties to agree to it that is a material terms of contracts of one party should not have the right to unilaterally change that or have any sort of disagreement the committee felt and we have research to back up that essentially reasonable parties will come to an agreement our changes and parties who aren't going to want to make a deal are not going to make a deal so anytime that the closing date needs to be changed from now on make sure that you are doing a pending change or an addendum to the contract there will be no automatic extension starting January 1st so earnest money is one of the sections of the contract that we get the most questions on as a quick reminder earnest money in the state of South Carolina can only be dispersed or a mutual agreement of the parties or a court order it cannot be there is no automatic dispersal earnest money in our contract I've been telling people that if you are currently using a contract that has contractual dispersement of earnest money you are not only using a contract that will be out dated January 1st you are currently using an outdated contract please stop using it the reasoning is we had a case that came from the Commission where the contract said if financing falls through earnest money returned to the buyer and then of course if the seller does not initiate a lawsuit within 30 days the buyer the escrow agent is authorized to disperse the funds on that exact scenario popped up from the Commission due to the Commission's interpretation of the statute which says that the reasonable party our party has a reasonable interpretation of the contract that they are titled to earnest money you cannot disperse they decided that then that case that the licensee had acted improperly and so we took all of our contractual language out of our contract and contractuals first an earnest-money language out of the contract so we do have a disclosure form that you can give your clients on to remind them of us it is form 620 is that earnest money to schools reform it's gonna let them know that hey earnest money can only be dispersed through mutual agreement of the parties or a court order or if you have a law firm holding the funds then that escrow agreement is gonna be what dictates it make sure if you have a law firm that is holding funds that it is an escrow agreement that use in actually in writing that you have your client look at it review it get legal advice if needed sign it get a copy of it and then also we get language put in there about whether or not our authorizing the law firm to direct communication about the funds to you as the broker so the only changes we actually made to the earnest money section are instead of it being do so many calendar days are so many business days after the effective date earnest-money will now be due by 6 p.m. on a hard date reminder since this is South Carolina's property all times in our South Carolina time so what you need to make sure any time we have dates with throughout the contract you need to make sure when you're negotiating if it's going back and forth and it's been a period of time that you've been negotiating look and make sure that the dates that you put in there originally still makes sense so you don't sort of box your buyer or seller into a deadline of an hour - so make sure that you're kind of keeping a list of those dates it's some sort of a spreadsheet or inside of any other file folder or something to that effect so we did get real like I said we did previously get rid of page eight so there will be no more escrow acknowledgement signature line that was sort of missing as depending on where you were in the state some believe that it was a acknowledgement that you received the funds other believe others believe that it was acknowledgment that you were just serving this escrow agent so because of that vagueness we got rid of it but we do have this language in the contract that party strength the escrow agent to communicate reasonable information confirming receipt and status of earnest money upon a broker request so if you want to know whether or not the earnest money has been received you simply need to ask we also added and languished at the bottom of the next sentence which is highlighted now that if earnest money is not delivered by the agreed-upon date the seller may terminate the contract by delivering notice to the buyer so that's a reminder if you're representing a buyer to make sure that that earnest money is turned in when it should and as a seller make sure that you are communicating whether or not the money's been received of course I would always recommend that these they ask for money and the confirmation of receipt be made in writing and not over the phone the next section transaction cost we did not change the entire thing but we moved a few paragraphs around so that's why we highlighted the entire section on the first thing I want to point out is the part that we have in red so we added in in the second paragraph all the costs associated with a homeowner's association or transfer fees throughout the contract we have a couple options where you can check one of two boxes we see on the hotline where either no box is checked or both boxes are checked I do highly recommend and advise you that when there when there's an order to only check one of the boxes I'm checking neither or both it's going to cause issues along the way well we have now added in language that if neither box is checked then they will automatically default to a seller cost of your representing the seller and you do not want your seller to pay for these make sure you check the buyers box the next thing is in the third paragraph throughout the courts or the overarching thought the committee had this year was hey every time we're making a changes it's gonna make the contract easier or harder for our members and one of the easiest way one of the easiest ways they thought they can make a change was when we have been the contract several times where it's a blank of multiple percentages or a hard dollar about any percentage to just say instead of having two numbers if someone needs to fill out a word that they kind of don't put the right number in there let's just have a hard dollar amount so now for a transaction cost it will just be a hard dollar amount the percentage of purchase price whichever is higher is going away so you will just have a hard value for those buyers cost otherwise the only other change to transaction cost as we did get rid of that that one that was at the very bottom so if you do need if you there's someone who did use that line previously we do have you know either use an addendum or we do have space at the end of the contract but there is no more line at the bottom of this six paragraph so financing I do want to point out if you've been one if you've watched the YouTube videos I did about a month ago there where have been two slight changes of the contracts since then both of them are in this paragraph so make sure that you are looking at this version and if there's a version that you printed out previously that you make the appropriate change so going back to the committee's goal of trying to make the contract easier and taking out multiple lines if they're not necessary we have now where it is just one one percentage of purchase price when you're getting financing as opposed to both percentages so in the original draft that we put out that word was minimum I've been doing classes across the state it was brought out to me by multiple members that hey I'm glad that you guys are just going to one percentage but I think you picked the wrong one it should have been maximum instead of minimum on that concern was brought back to the forms committee who agreed in and said may the recommendation that we changed it to maximum percentage and then that change was approved by the executive committee so it is now going to be a maximum percentage of purchase price not a minimum so if you have a previous version that says minimum make sure that you scratch it out and put maximum so you're using it the way the form will be January 1st the other two things that we do cover a few other things we do in the financing section where you currently have in your version where your contract where buyers will apply for financing by you know so many effective businesses after the effective date that is now going to be a hard date so be a reminder again if you're negotiating back and forth to make sure that that date still makes sense but financing will be done by a hard date and then this is the other change that has been made since we did t e videos is that delivery of that pre final loan approval will be defied it will be delivered by a hard date it will no longer be calendar days or business days it will be a hard date so the buyer will apply for financing by a hard date and then they will deliver that approval by a hard date and reminder the financing period is anytime from when you apply for financing through the end of closing so if you have a buyer who wants to change their lender during that finance' period again from the time you apply for financing through closing the buyer is going to need to notify the seller in writing within so many calendar days that they intend to change their lender now if they because they change the lender that closing date that we agreed that they agreed upon and paragraph four is going to change his direct result they are not able to do that without written approval by the seller again this was a two-party contract you can't just have one party who changes the terms of the contract on what they out there there's approval and like I said because we got rid of the automatic extension you were technically gonna have to do that anyway but it's just over emphasize especially if you're representing a buyer the hey remember you if you keep shopping for a lender and if that changes the closing data as a result you're gonna need to get the source permission if you are representing a seller make sure that you get something from the buyers bank into writing that says either that the closing will not change is it direct result do not just take it as a word-of-mouth thing I would get some sort of documentation from the bank requesting or letting you know that that closing data is not going to I've since been asked well what happens that the loan type changes but not the actual lender we have these boxes down here FHA VA conventional seller make sure that if you've checked the FHA and now it's going to be a conventional or vice-versa that you would need to do a pendant ain't change on this so the biggest change we actually made to the contract starting January 1st is to the repair section this is the section of the contract that we get the most questions on in the Legal Hotline and this is probably where the committee spent most of their large portion of their time so there will now be three options directly in the contract for repairs we've currently had three options but they were in three different forms we kind of move them all into one form so you will no longer have a due diligence addendum starting January 1st because due diligence is now in the contract additionally the as is language that is currently found in form 391 will be deleted January 1st because as is is now in the contract so there will be three options for you to check please only check one of the options if you check none of the boxes the contract will default to an as this contract and regards to repairs if multiple boxes are checked then the first one up in the order will count so if you check all three you're going to operate under a repair procedure if you check due diligence and as is you're gonna operate under due diligence so the easiest way to sort of think about repairs is to kind of think of what the obligations of the buyer of the seller are under each of these conditions so the easiest one to explain on this as is under as is the seller has an obligation to fix absolutely nothing and the buyer has absolutely no can ask for whatever they want but is not there's no expectation anything will be fixed essentially as this you see what you see is what you get there's no real repair operation in there the next is due diligence again this is the the sellers obligations are no difference under ton no different under due diligence and as is so the seller has no obligation under due diligence to fix anything but likewise the buyer can ask for anything they want anything any repair that they deem necessary and then the two parties either come to an agreement on those two on that list of repairs the buyer walks away by the delivering notice of termination or the seller or the or they take the house as is so now we get to a repair procedure repair procedure takes this entire Universal repairs that could be done and shrinks it down to sort of the systems and the big items so the buyer is only really the buyer can ask for whatever they want but if it's not one of these systems then the seller has no obligation to fix it but if the buyer asks for one of these systems to be made operable and the seller does not fix it then the buyer has recourse to walk away so let's actually get to the changes we made to the repair seat or repair sections so the first paragraph you see here under repair procedure is going to be your buyers paragraph so where we currently hand our version have so many business days that they have to do their inspections and then there's a request deadline it is now going to be all clear spell inspections and request will be completed and delivered to the seller by 6:00 p.m. on a hard date so reminder again if it's a day if you doing negotiations in your contract make sure that that day makes sense give yourself plenty of time because this will be your deadline for doing all your inspections and requests if the buyer does not return this in by their deadline the buyer will have waived their right to inspection or to their record repair request under the contract so what it can the buyer asks for and expect to actually get fixed so the first so mainly the repair procedure like I said this is the the buyer who just wants a house that works they want this are to fix the big stuff so where the the smaller items the buyer will potentially try to either negotiate for fix themselves so the first thing they're going to do is make sure the following systems aren't operable condition that's just that means that they work so heating system make sure that we turn on the heat and hot air comes out air conditioning system we turn on the a/c and cold air comes out electrical system we turn on all the lights switches and lights come on plumbing systems water is going in and going out the way that it should water supply system we turn on all the spigots the water comes out the right way and in the bright color wastewater system we can when we flush all the commodes and the water goes out the pipes not on the floor at that point all the systems are in operable condition Nexxus that we make sure the roof is free of leaks remind this is important that it is Ruth is free of leaks it does not address the age of the roof the useful life of the roof it is simply that the roof is free of leaks if it is a super old roof but it is not leaking there is no obligation of the seller to give you a new roof regardless of when an inspection says of the useful life of the roof it is simply that the roof has to be free of leaks the next is to address environmental concerns and to make improvements structurally sound those are intentionally broad because if we were to list every possible environmental concern in every possible and structural issue the contract would be 80 pages long and our experience this is usually where parties who want to buy or sell a house come to a mutual agreement and the parties who don't this is usually where they part ways so the obvious environmental concerns would be things such as mold and radon issues and obviously the improvements are actually sound would be hey you know there's our foundational crack things of that sort other smaller items that's going to be usually like I said where they negotiate so again if the buyer does not meet this deadline that the buyer has waived all their rights in terms under this section the next question is well what if the lender requires additional inspections or certification then those are going to have to be provided by the buyer and the buyer at their expense will do the following inspections the last thing we added to this paragraph is that upon a seller's request the buyer will provide the seller by the copying of the inspection report this is mostly put in by the committee as a conflict resolution or a mediation tool so if the parties are debating well hey I know you say my electrical so my air conditioning system is inoperable what do you mean it's not operable you know is it completely not working or we simply having a disagreement on the Delta of degrees of which it is blowing of the the temperature that the area is blowing versus what it should be blow so I would recommend you know obviously buyer can provide what they would like to as documentation um you know it could just be the summary it could be whatever it won't you know are the actual sections of the report but if the buyer is sort of not providing anything with the sell to the seller or the seller blaze they need more information than the seller can request a copy of the entire inspection report or whichever parts of it that they would like reminder to the sellers agents that you probably don't want to just do this as in every time tool up is saying hey we're just gonna ask for the inspection report every time because once you receive receipt of the inspection report you're going to be liable for disclosing whatever you find in there and that may change disclosure issues for your seller so now we're going to go to the second paragraph which is the sellers paragraph so by no later than 6:00 p.m. on a hard date the seller will either will deliver notice that they are going to agree to or make the repairs that the buyers asked for that meet with are those systems roofer E leaks environmental concerns improvement structurally sound if the seller agrees to make all of those then the contract then the repair section of the contract is over you move on to the failure portions if there's a disagreement on those then that's when we go on to this third paragraph that of which the party the buyer will have two calendar days to accept the property in its pricing condition negotiate for payment of repairs or terminate the contract by delivering notice and if the buyer does not do any of those within the two calendar days and we haven't as this contract what I do want to point out in the second paragraph is language that was added by the Committee on this has always been the case but we we've have gained calls on the hotline of hey was this is our paid repair is this you know what what about this what about that and so it's the committee we kind of sat down and say hey work things that you commonly get questions about and let's just go ahead and put them in the contract so like I said these are not currently solar paid repairs but it's not explicitly stay in the contract but we've added this in there to sort of help so if you're representing a buyer and you add you know when you meet with them and say hey what kind of repairs do you really want done in the house if they keep coming back to things that are in this sentence right here then maybe repair procedures not going to be the best option for you but it's just sort of a reminder that Solar paid repairs do not include the following items home maintenance flooring flooring means type of flooring so you want hardwood floors you want you know tile whatever I mean does not mean if the flooring is not secure then that is a structural issue that's not what's meant by flooring fog windows grandfather to code issues which includes GFI landscaping preventative maintenance cosmetic changes home improvement in energy efficiency if the seller if the buyer is are insisting on any of these repairs being done then I would encourage them to do due diligence and not as it and not repair procedure because the silver is not obligated under repair procedure to fix any of these now of course the parties can always negotiate for them but if the seller is only willing to do the things that are on the seller paid repairs there is no recourse for the buyer to leave so now we remove onto due diligence so this is the exact verbage that's in your current due diligence agreement our denim except for we changed it from business age to a hard deadline of 6:00 p.m. so reminder due diligence period do you have to do everything we just covered in that first paragraph and that first section in that time period so instead of multiple dates and deadlines it's one hard deadline so if we were to say hey our due diligence period ends on December at 6:00 p.m. on December 30th the buyer within that time period would need to conduct and obtain any and all inspections that they would like they would need to deliver the request of those to the seller and then they would either need to negotiate with that with the seller either the seller would accept all those requests and at that point the due diligence period would end regardless of how many days were left or the parties would negotiate back and forth and eventually they're proceeding under an amended contract extend the time period of the due diligence by by an addendum or terminate the contract by delivering those determination and a termination fee if the buyer does not do any of those things by that deadline by you know one take past 6:00 p.m. on the 30th of December then the contract will be as is in regards to repairs and there will be no more due diligence period so make sure if you're representing a buyer and say we were going to have the due diligence period end on December 30th that we would tell our buyer hey by the 22nd of December we're going to do all of our inspections we're going to deliver that request to the seller we're going to let the seller gab until the 27th to tell us whether or not they're going to make those requests by putting an expiration in their request proposal if the seller agrees then we are done and then our due diligence period ends on the 27th or whenever the seller agrees to the terms if they do not agree then you have three days to sort of negotiate or if the seller does nothing at that point then the buyer would need to proceed about our look at possibly terminating a reminder again that do do it that earnest money can only be dispersed your mutual agreement of parties or a court order that includes in due diligence so what I always say is if you were going to terminate under due diligence I would recommend that the buyer's agent when they drop off the termination fee and the notice of termination also attach a release agreement stating that they earn it wherever the earnest money we go because if that's the earnest money at that release agreement is signed at the time then both parties can move on and that handles the issue the other thing to consider is if you're doing due diligence to maybe when previously where we had had a date for the earnest money to be due to have the earnest money due after the do do after the due diligence period and that way that results having to worry about earnest money during due diligence so the last option we have is as is so this is the option again that you are going to be stuck with if you do not check any of the boxes this is not an option for most transactions the thought of the committee was that this is an option for it for investors largely cash buyers who are probably either going to take the house down to the studs do large scale of renovations or simply going to demo the property for the land if you have someone who's looking to move into their house tomorrow you may not you do not want to do as is a reminder just because a property has been listed in the MLS as is does not mean that you have to check the Asus box in the contract because due diligence like I said the obligations of the seller are no different under due diligence and as is so the seller can just do a due diligence contract it still does not obligate them to fix anything but maybe the buyer only comes back with you know a few hundred dollars worth of repairs and the sellers willing to do that additionally if an offer comes in for 30% over list price a sellers may likely say hey that's going to cover the any cost of repairs I'm fine doing repair procedure instead of as is so what's actually in the as is language a reminder that the as is clause on Form 391 will go away start any January first because there is now language in the contract so the buyer agrees to help by the for the purchase pr ce while the seller agrees to maintain the property subject to normal wear and tear the buyer does have the right to inspect the property by 6:00 p.m. on a hard date for informational purposes only this is largely so the buyer who is going to do renovations can kind of look at the property figure out exactly which renovations are going to be neat being needed and they can go ahead and start trying to schedule those for after closing the seller is under no obligation to remedy any issues the buyer discovers during the inspections and the buyer may not terminate the contract based on the results of any inspections conducted so if the buyer it does not matter what the buyer finds in that home and the seller is under no obligation to fix it and the buyer cannot walk away it does not matter if the buyer finds black mold from floor to ceiling it does not matter if the buyer finds you know holes in every wall it does not matter what they'll at the buyer what the buyer has to buy the house as is the seller just has to maintain it subject to normal wear and tear so I normally get the question here when I fill my classes about what what about termites so there are three there are three contingencies in our contract that fall outside of their repair section and those are financing appraisal and wood infestation or termite so those three contingencies are going to fall outside of the repair section and are going to be separate contingencies because of their timelines one thing I did want to mention potentially though for wouldn't for termites is if you have a client who is under due diligence and has a certain fear or mistrust about termites they may want to go ahead and do a termite inspection during their due diligence period because under our term under our seal and under termite inspection contingency if termites are found in the home and the seller agrees to fix it then the buyer has no recourse to walk under the cut on the contract under due diligence if you were to do a termite inspection and they were to find termites then the buyer would be able to walk regardless of whether or not the seller agreed to fix them or not so if you have a buyer from a part of the country that is not familiar with termites or has in particular a phobia about termites you may want to consider doing a termite inspection during the due diligence period so the next change we made is to paragraph nine on inspection rights this has probably already been market standard a lot of places but it was not explicitly stated in the contract so we added in there that the seller will grant the buyer to the right to perform a final walkthrough inspection other property within 48 hours prior to the closing date the next-gen we did not change anything on r appraisal or what infestation reminder appraisal the only essentially the way the appraisal contingency works is you have a house listed for a certain price the appraisal comes in at ten percent under that the buyer the seller has five days two calendar days to either change the their list price or the contract price to that new appraised value or the buyer can walk you know it does not work the other way so the appraisal comes in ten percent above list price you do not get to raise the price of the house you simply the appraisal contingency only works at the appraisal comes in lower and reminder on the Wood infestation that this is going to be outside of those repairs section because it cannot be any it cannot be done dated any earlier than thirty days prior to closing and obviously again if something is found in the home the buyer the seller has and the seller agrees to fix it then the buyer remedies under that section or earth gone if the solar refuses to fix them then the buyer has can either to accept the property in its present condition if they have lending gear and one make sure that they check with their lender before accepting that option negotiate with the seller for the payments and treatment or they're gonna terminate contract by delivering notice to the seller a reminder again that that does not obligate that does not mean the buyers can get their earnest money back that has to be through mutual during the parties or a court order so the next section we changed we didn't change this language that you seen fourteen is currently in nearby and your contract under paragraph 28 for brokers compensation but because it covered home warranty companies we moved it to the home warranty section a reminder that you cannot get a referral fee from a home warranty company as that is a closing service and that is a RESPA issue but if the home warranty company pays you some nominal fee for filling out the paper for them you can receive compensation for that you just need to make sure that you are telling your client about it get that in writing give it to them and writing and the buyer and your client will have the right to say that that you are not to get the funds or that they may ask for them as it is a rebate reminder and that if you are receiving any compensation or anything from a transaction other than the compensation your client agreed to pay you or your customer agreed to pay you that you need to make the disclosure in writing immediately and that your client or customer may have the right to ask that you not accept that so we did not change anything on the following on the you know from the rest of the next page to pages on the next changes we made are the paragraph 29 um just as a reminder that notice is a unilateral communications any time you're sending a notice of termination or various other notice that does not require both parties to sign that is simply a unilateral request and then we added in the word only to remind you that all notices are only considered effective when they are delivered to the proper notice address or email written below so for the buyer there's a line here for notice address email and fax and for seller notice address email and fax if you were to send them a contract or send them any sort of offer and it is not sent to one of the either the address the email or the fax number that is listed here it is not considered to be delivered so make sure that you have the proper wherever if you're representing a buyer seller wherever you would like your communication sent make sure that you have that address in there because otherwise it will not count so the last big change we made to the actual to the contract is expiration of offer so the issue we've seen a couple times on the hotline is where an offer will be sent and there will be no expiration of offer written in there it will be this section will be left blank traditionally in what's happening on the hotline is the offer that's submitted is well below the list price of the house the listing agent and the bot the seller decides that they do not even want to project the offer because they are sorting because they're it's not worth their time and the buyer is absent minded and it forgets to revoke the offer or withdraw the offer so we have an offer with no expiration date that is sort of sitting out there it has not been rejected it has not been revoked Ness five six months go by the list price of the house has now changed and now that that initial offer which was insulting is now a reasonable offer and the buyer and the seller greased and actually goes ahead and signs this because the offer was never rejected and it was not revoked by the buyer and it did not expire because the expiration of offer was left blank um the buyer is now on under a contract for the home which means the buyer is either going to have to buy the house or they're gonna have to engage legal counsel to get out of the contract so we've added in language here that if the offer this offer will automatically expire with 30 calendar days after the offer submitted if there's no action taken by either party so if the offer has not been accepted rejected countered or withdrawn it will automatically expire within 30 days but again please do not send conned off contractual offers without an expiration and please if you receive them reject them and ask the person who put in an expiration of offer in there we did add in two additional buyer lines and two additional seller lines if you have if you have more than four buyers or for sellers then you're going to still need to use an addendum form but we at least have added in two more lines there will be now for checkbox there will be four initial boxes for buyer and for initial boxes for so are at the bottom of the page as well as the page number and form number I'm the we're just having someone who has more text technical expertise than me do that and the last one like I said we got rid of page 8 of the contract and has been replaced by these four lines so the buyer's agent will fill out the first two lines and the seller agent will fill out the last two lines and they'll essentially put their their comp their name their company on their license number and their office code your office code can be found either on your pocket card or by doing a licensee lookup of yourself on LRS on the real estate commission website and then your email address and phone number reminder that these are direct that these addresses are not going to be what matters for notice if they notice is going to have to be what's on these notice address lines so those are the only changes to the contract so if you hear about any other changes that you are being made the contract this year you know that that's not the case because you have now sat through this so reminder again there are few addendums that are going to be changed due to the language changes in the contract on the first like I said is the due diligence addendum will go away January first and then there will be slight our language changes to reflect the changes in business days to forms 391 504 and 525 so that is your clauses for addenda our Denham amendment to your buyer sale contingency and the repair done them so now we're going to go over the changes to the buyer's agency agreement the listing agreement and then I'm going to cover a quick change the properties closure statement which is an lor form so the buyer agency agreement the first change that we made is more of a reorganization than an actual language change and that's to the compensation to broker so currently under the contract you have option a b c and d a and b are sort of your retainer and service fees option c is where the buyer will pay a brokerage fee of certain amount the buyer's agent is going to try their best to get the get it out of the transaction either through the mls compensation or through a Fizbo or through the seller but if they are not able to do so then the buyer is going to pay the brokerage fee and then option D is essentially this where a broker will try to obtain payment of the brokerage fee out of the transaction but if they're not able to get out of the transaction or the Fizbo then the buyer will be solely by will not be responsible for paying the brokerage fee so we found that most people are either using C or D and so what we did is we move those up to the top and is now under brokerage brokerage fees so if you your brought your buyer when they are selecting what the compensation will be we'll check the appropriate boxes and then they will initial next to the option so what used to be C is now option 1 what used to be option 2 what used to be D is option 2 so there are only two options so please do not initial both because they have conflicting language please only if you're doing a brokerage we make sure you're only and having your buyer initial one of these and then if there's a retainer fee or service fee then they will hit check the box on B and then fill out the number there and then whether or not it will be credited against the brokerage fee or not so you can check any initial any that are applicable this will also protect you for claims later that the buyer is not aware of what their compensation to you was as they will have to check the box and initialed here initial at the bottom of the page and then F sign the agreement so it's sort of a three-way check of making sure um that they are aware of what they've agreed to um the next change we made is on the last page of the buyer agency agreement in which was to include a paragraph about surveillance um so more and more houses are starting to get some sort of you know video of you know cameras in the house or a ring or something to that effect so we have now are going to have you advise your buyer that assume that just assume every house you go into as both audio and video surveillance and because we're aware that we're going to conduct any and all communications about the property off site I'm key point being off site not in the backyard because there are outdoor cameras just advise your buyer essentially hey if the seller was walking right walking around with us in the house would you say it if you would not say to the seller space do not say it in the sellers home because there is a chance that they that they may be watching and then we added in two additional buyer lines as well so now there will be four buyer lines on the buyers agreement and those are the only changes to the buyer agency agreement effective January 1st 2020 so going on to the listing agreement the first change we made is we flipped paragraphs 2 & 3 around so on your current listing agreement you actually talked about compensation to other brokerages other agents before you talk about the total terms of the agreement the committee again saying let's try make the form simpler for everyone so why are we talking about a slice of the pie before we're talking about the entire pie so we simply flip the two paragraphs around so you're now going to talk about the total fee and is to remind everyone that that's the total fee we've added in the word totaled up next to fee and commission and then we have moved the conversation other agents to be the second paragraph underneath the third pair underneath the terms paragraph so the next two paragraphs that we added to the contract to the listing agreement are on the last page so the first one is photography this language was in the transaction brokerage agreement last year we had receipt we sort of beta-test a bit there had not got any negative feedback about it so we added it in here make sure that you remember the answer to this question because if a seller reads this entire listing agreement as they should they will have a question on this but if you know the answer to it it will be a very short conversation versus if you are not sure the answer is going to be a much more lengthy conversation so under this section the seller is gonna revelry convey any of their audio photography videography rights in perpetuity involving themselves and their property to the broker for marketing and advertising or any other purposes deemed necessary by the broker so the main reason for this paragraph is because of the internet so you guys take photos of property and is put on various feeds and it goes you know ten thousand different places on the internet you know you can't possibly be held liable for where all these photos go and how and be responsible for taking them off so that essentially the seller does agree that you have the rights to take further property for marking and advertising purposes so this is not for if you have a side business where you do landscaping or interior design you cannot use the photos for that you cannot decide that you are going to become an amateur photographer and use the photos for that purpose right if you have a if you use a photographer their photography agreement is going to be what dictates the terms of that um so make sure that you if you use a photographer that they have that agreement and you get it to your client or whoever needs to to review it in to sign it there are only two ways in which you can use a photograph correctly and legally um the first is that you take the foot you actually take the photo yourself and the other is that you pay for the image if you have not one of the done one of those two things you are likely violating some sort of copyright photography rules or her regulations or laws so make sure that you are doing right wait just be if when you inherit a listing from someone else you do not have the right to use their listing list photos without their permission I'm go ahead and take the photos yourself um if a seller tells you hey I own these photos make sure you do some due diligence on that to make sure that they actually do own them that they have the right to give them to you that they aren't simply misinterpreting a license that they have so the photos or they may just be lying to you because they would just want their house sold the last section we added in here is must refrain surveillance so reminder we just have formed everyone starting chant every buyer in the state starting January 1st that hey just assume that you're being surveilled when you enter into a home so the element of surprise is largely gone and this is how you can sort of sell it to explain to your seller so the sellers can agree to abide by all laws and regulations regarding audio and video surveillance of their property including they're not going to put it and please places where people that have an expectation of privacy such as a restroom next the buyer-seller is going to either agree that you may or may not make disclosure of this surveillance as deemed necessary including signage on the property or advertising or marketing so again you just recommend it to everyone you every buyer in the state has just been informed that you are going to have you're likely going to have surveillance in the house so they're not really you're not really surprising anyone if there is seller cannot if the seller has a particular safety or security reason for which they do not want to make the disclosure it's still their property they can do so but if they don't have one of those make sure they can just check the may box and then when you have an open house or something just put a nice sign at the front that just says hey smile and you're on camera or surveillance on the property on that way parties are informed um and then we added in to owner lines two more owner lines so there will be now for owner lines on the listing agreement and those are the only changes to the list agreement um so the last thing I want to cover is and like it so any changes you've seen to what you saw today to form 310 will be made to form 300 as well the condo contract starting January 1st the surveillance language from the buyer agency agreement will also be added to the exclusive right to buyer's agency form 135 and then the list agreement are the exclusive right to listen see the those photography and surveillance paragraphs will be added there as well starting January 1st so the last thing I want to point out is this is a change that is effective January 1st but has already been made on our website on zip forms that loop DocuSign but so but if you have a previously printed out disclosure state our residential properties closure statement you can still use those until January 1st but any new any disclosure statement is filled out after January 1st must use the new version and that will be the one that has a revision date of 11 2019 on it so the way there was one change that was made it is on the third page of the form on question 25 so what have the we s you are your CEO Nick remise presented the Commission earlier and late summer early or late summer early fall that hey we have agents across the state who are having issues with FEMA claims on the property you know due to recent storms we have had off the emergency declaration almost every year for the last five years in the state of South Carolina and previously FEMA claims on a property were confidential so an individual would buy a home have it to make a claim shortly thereafter and it would discover that hey under the previous owner - two or three claims were made now that kind of puts me in a third or fourth claim on a property and now my flood insurance rates are astronomical so we will now have wonder here that the seller will disclose if there had been any clean claims made on the proper teacher in their ownership and if so they need to list the dates of all those claims so make sure that you are using the new form though which will be effective like it is currently available wherever you have art forms but you need to make sure that you are using that starting January 1st because that is the hard effective date for that form so those are the only forms changes that will be effective January 1st if you have any questions on those um feel free to reach out to me at Austin at SC real tours org I also have six in-person classes that I'm still died six boards that I still I'm doing in-person classes for before the end of the year um I will be in Buford tomorrow Greenwood on Thursday Hilton Head on Friday Charleston the following are this Monday the 16th Columbia is having one that Wednesday at the ser office and Greenville is having one that Thursday the 19th if you would like to attend any of those contact that local board as they are in charge of their registration for that like said but if you have any questions I'm happy to answer those and I do appreciate it