‘We want all the names’: 49 Inman readers weigh in on NAR’s scandal

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Pulse is a recurring column where we ask for readers’ takes on varying topics in a weekly survey and report back with our findings.

The past week has brought revelations, resignations and reevaluations of the way the National Association of Realtors does business. How does it protect employees and member volunteers? What are the consequences for bad behavior at the very top of the leadership structure? And, most importantly, what’s next for the country’s largest and, arguably, most powerful trade organization?

As agents look for “more than statements” from NAR leadership, there has also been frustration at the lack of response from industry leaders beyond the trade group. For many, it’s time for a “deep cleanse” of real estate leadership across the board.

We think you should be a key part of answering the important questions being asked right now, and we want to amplify your voice. That’s why, in this week’s Pulse, we asked: What should happen next at NAR? Are the people in power capable of making the changes members want? Is this a case of one bad apple? Who’s in a position to decide?

We are grateful for all of your responses (and there were a lot of them). Here are the best of the best:

‘A complete house cleaning is required’

• Change in leadership! 
• A complete house cleaning is required. The top brass had to know something was going on with Parcell and turned a blind eye. 
• Hire a third party to review policies, update them and move forward to focus on serving the consumer. 
• Independent investigation and full disclosure of the results. 
• Complete restructuring; no volunteers in leadership! 
• This is a touch question because it takes years to build the relationships necessary to succeed at the highest levels of the NAR, and it also takes time to learn how the organization works and functions. The NAR needs a combination of seasoned veterans, who know the system and newcomers, who can question why things are done a certain way and bring a different perspective and challenge the status quo. 
• Clean house: staff and leadership.
• An outside firm needs to come in and perform an extensive review of all departments and present the findings at the NAR conference in Nov. 2023. 

‘Like a federal government bureaucracy’

• A total restructuring, after an evaluation of all departments and department leadership. NAR offers very little value now and has become much like a federal government bureaucracy. 
• Remove Bob Goldberg, Mark Birschbach, Donna Gland and all of HR. Then sever Matthew Embrescia’s vendor relationship with NAR. 
• Why do we need a national association? My local board provides MLS service. 
• Take a serious look into revising the leadership hierarchy to include the CEO as the leader of the association vs. a new volunteer president each year. Most businesses are run this way. Keep volunteer positions prominent, engaging and impactful, but the CEO needs to be the consistent leader and ultimately responsible for our mission, strategies, core goals, ultimate successes and failures. 
• NAR should be cleaned from the top down. 
• I feel that membership should become optional for real estate brokers and agents. In nearly 20 years in the profession, I still find very little use in what NAR does to assist agents. Within the first year in the profession, I stopped reading about anything NAR produced, as I felt it was worthless and still feel like that. 
• It’s a game beyond perceptions. Right now the general sentiment is that the number of agents corresponds to profits for brokerages as well as NAR. 1.5 million strong shows that we are much more concerned about quantity than quality. Put yourself in the shoes of a disruptor organization, like Zillow or Redfin: Their best bet is going to be to advocate for a fundamental change to happen. It’s probably better to be on the front end of this change than responsive to it and showing weakness/loyalty to the system. 

‘Separation of the MLS from the Realtor associations’

• The separation of the MLS from the Realtor associations will have huge implications with domino effects that will affect all areas of NAR governance. Membership will drop drastically, which will force drastic change. Without the MLS breakup happening, I don’t see NAR changing of their own volition. 
• Perhaps this is the opportunity for NAR and local Associations to take a look at how they are structured and separate residential from commercial. Most commercial brokers, even if Realtors do not call themselves Realtors, it is underplayed, and they call themselves CRE brokers or agents. Some markets have separate divisions for commercial, and some are very strong while others are non-existent. 
• Stop putting men in charge, especially in an industry dominated by women. Stop wasting agents’ money on embarrassing, low-quality advertising. Build some accountability into the organization. 
• This is more than just the bad actions of the former president. The people and the culture that supported these actions need to be addressed. I am glad that they are seeking a new CEO, and I think a big part of choosing the next person will be examining how they have handled scandals, loss of trust and turning around an organization. 
• NAR should give agents the option to join (and any licensee should be able to obtain MLS whether they join or not). NAR should ask the agents what they want and stop deciding for us. There should be transparency for every single decision made. 

‘NAR is too focused on its own preservation’

• NAR is too focused on its own preservation — as almost all institutions end up doing. Brokerages and associations continue to support the premise that the survival of the organization is more important than the survival of the members who fund it. The model is not in alignment with the needs of today’s agents or consumers. NAR needs to be significantly reduced in its organizational breadth and membership. It should be focused on enforcement of ridding bad behavior at the organization, brokerage, and agent level. It should work to make the Realtor moniker actually be a noticeable difference from licensees. Make me want to belong as opposed to forcing me to belong to my local and state associations and NAR in order to access my MLS. 
• I would tell you that NAR has to regain our trust but that isn’t true for over 50,000 agents around me. We are forced into membership in order to be part of the MLS. The reality is that NAR should have to regain agents’ trust and I would start with more than just the president, it should be a full purge. We want all the names and we want all of them terminated without any pay. We want new leadership with an open mind and an open conversation. Honestly I think that if brokers and agents could, they would quit and leave, and they should. NAR has never done anything for me personally except take my money. The one time I suggested a local topic to our legislative liaison they told me that school districts are minefields, and we don’t talk about those (I guess schools don’t matter when it comes to housing?). Seriously NAR needs to be broken up as a monopoly.
• Parcell should be fired along with any other person in a leadership position who allowed, fostered or turned a blind eye to this ridiculous and antiquated behavior. no one acts like that anymore and for good reason. 
• An organizational “Constitutional Convention” to review the Mission, amend as necessary to redefine the organization’s true goals, assisting real estate agents in all ways possible to help create increasing home ownership in our nation through training, education, advocacy and needed housing supply advocacy. 
• Deep dive into capacity of volunteer leaders to address issues. 
• Learn from mistakes, but this is still a strong organization that stands for the rights of Realtors and property owners.

‘Bob Goldberg should resign’

• Bob Goldberg should resign; this is a direct reflection on his leadership.
• They should not stand in the way of other competing organizations to give agents choices.
• The lack of transparency is terrible. 
• A complete wipeout of the national, state. and local board members and resignations from anyone part of the NAR/Realogy/RE/MAX/KW/HomeServices members from power until the lawsuit commences. RICO investigation should be conducted to get this criminal organization that’s infiltrated NAR through these conglomerates to determine criminality. A billion dollars of assets and other for-profit discoveries are coming to surface and the fact that NAR is footing the bill for those conglomerates should be enough to hint at more anti-trust violations to be investigated on those individuals. 
• Tell Goldberg goodbye.
• I am a member of NAR purely and exclusively because I am required to be to access forms. NAR is an ill-disguised, self-feeding monster that does absolutely nothing as it drips down to the local level when it comes to enforcing ethics and disciplining or teaching those who outright break the law on the state and local levels. At this point, it exists for the sole purpose of funding political candidates that fully 50 percent of us disagree with and who cause us actual harm. Locally, I have seen outright racism on social media and a huge amount of posted concern about the genitals of others and which clothing encases them. Nothing is ever done by those who are tasked with enforcing ethics. Retaliation is a real factor where I live, and I am reading that I am not alone. I don’t agree with supporting politics that I blatantly oppose as a means of staying employed any more than I agree with forcing people to practice a certain religion to be employed, and yet here we are. The next move? Mow it down, and build it correctly if at all. 
• We should no longer be required to be members of NAR. As soon as the money dries up, changes will come faster. 
• The board of directors should vote to remove Goldberg, the HR department and the legal team. Additionally, the volunteer leadership team, through, and including Brown, should be replaced. 
• They must relinquish their stranglehold on the MLSs. The traditional tying agreements must end. Then they focus on making “Realtor” actually mean something. 

Kasper and Brown ‘will lead NAR out of this situation’

• President Tracy Kasper and Vice President Kevin Brown are strong leaders who will lead NAR out of this situation and create a more open and transparent NAR. The strength of NAR and the ability to lead the industry and serve our 1.5 million members will be better than before. It will not be an easy task as trust has been breached. We respect the women who came forward and NAR will work diligently to ensure we learn from this and a new culture will emerge. This effort will be led by our strong leadership over the next three years, Tracey Kasper, Kevin Sears and Kevin Brown. Through the efforts of the capable and dedicated staff.
• Everyone in a power position should resign or be fired.
• An outside firm should evaluate the existing policies related to harassment and retaliation and investigate what seems to be systemic issues in the organization. And then make recommendations to resolve the issues. Soon. As in, now.
•  Put women in charge!
• Increase transparency.
• The leadership that condoned the problem cannot address the problem.
• Bob Goldberg needs to go. There is no faith in the org at this time. A search for a CEO outside of any current NAR employee should be undertaken and someone with integrity hired to do a complete overhaul and house cleaning and reorganization. That’s the only credible solution. 

‘Another money-grab outfit’

• Get rid of it. Another money-grab outfit.
• There should be a complete report on how the dues were used to pay out investigations and settlements. Second, there should be term limits and not a little mafia of who you know, and that is how you climb to leadership. Third, a complete report as to when and who knew about the issues, clearly this is nothing new. Just for starters.
• Time to rethink the tie-in arrangement that forces licensed real estate agents to join the local, state and national associations to access the MLS, even if the local MLS is not association-owned. The well-entrenched leadership has no sense of responsibility to the membership. Many of the “Members” feel more like hostages. If you think the national association is corrupted … take a closer look at many of the state associations … terrible. 
• All leadership condoned by not speaking out and allowing the coverup. All resign.
• NAR needs to be restructured. Under the current structure, change isn’t possible. If restructuring isn’t possible, members should initiate a dues strike. 
• Clean house. Why does Goldberg still have a job? Bring in outside crisis expert, HR expert, and culture expert. Take their suggestions seriously and enact them. PAG is worthless in this situation.
• Decouple NAR membership from MLS.

What did we miss? Please share your thoughts in the comments section below.

Editor’s note: These responses were given anonymously and, therefore, are not attributed to anyone specifically. Responses were also edited for grammar and clarity.