A video message from REBGV’s Chair: Addressing the open house question and other recent COVID-19 questions

Watch a video message from REBGV’s Chair Colette Gerber that addresses whether to hold open houses today and other recent COVID-19 questions we’ve been hearing from members. 

Please also read the below resources to better understand your responsibilities as a professional during the second phase of the province’s re-opening plan, which began last week.

• WorkSafeBC’s protocols for real estate professionals
• REBGV’s Broker checklist for re-opening offices
• WorkSafeBC’s protocols to re-open office workspaces
• WorkSafeBC's re-opening safety plan template

WorkSafeBC’s real estate re-opening criteria and more COVID-19 resources

WorkSafeBC released real estate-specific re-opening guidelines to help offices around the province understand what actions need to be taken to operate safely in today’s environment.

These guidelines also outline what practices WorkSafeBC expects real estate professionals to follow when practicing outside of an office environment.

Key points include:

• Providing virtual services like livestreaming open houses and showings;
• Avoiding in-person contact as much as possible;
• Limiting party sizes and enforcing physical distancing measures;
• Adding enhanced cleaning and hygiene protocols, like disinfecting frequently touched surfaces before and after each showing; and
• Avoiding exposure as much as possible by not shaking hands, viewing multiple properties in person in a day, and sharing business tools like pens.

Click here to read the guidelines.

REBGV resources

Your Board has created a checklist for real estate offices to be used in conjunction with WorkSafeBC’s guides.

Click here to read the checklist.

We've also created a video that shows you how to safely conduct in-person showings during the pandemic. Watch the video here. 

Other COVID-19 resources

The federal government recently launched a new tool that’ll help you find out what benefits you qualify for. Fill out the questionnaire to understand your options.

Your Board also maintains an up-to-date list of available aid on REBGV.ca. This table includes aid for Realtors, Brokers, and clients.

Visit our COVID-19 info hub for all our resources and more information.

Expert Series: Four questions with Mortgage Broker Angela Calla

In our new Expert Series, we're asking prominent figures from across the real estate industry to share their insights and expertise with our members. Today, we’re featuring Mortgage Broker Angela Calla.

Angela is an award-winning mortgage expert with 16 years of experience. Alongside her team, she helps mortgage holders get the best mortgage. She's also hosted The Mortgage Show on CKNW for over a decade, and is a best-selling author with her book The Mortgage Code, available on Amazon. 

Angela can be reached at callateam@dominionlending.ca or 604-802-3983.

Here are her answers to the four questions we asked her.

The Bank of Canada significantly cut interest rates at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. What do home buyers need to know about this change?

This change presents an opportunity to help Canadians invest in themselves. With rates at where they are today, approximately 50 per cent of the payments they make goes toward the principal amount borrowed. They can position themselves to be mortgage-free faster, reduce their largest monthly payment (the mortgage), or use that capital for other lifestyle goals. If anyone currently has a mortgage over 3.5 per cent or has a mortgage renewal coming up, it’s time to plan how to get your equity working for you.

What advice do you have for home buyers looking to optimize today’s mortgage options?

Mortgages should be reviewed at least once a year to see if there are any market changes you can take advantage of or life stage/style changes we can plan for to ensure your mortgage is structured in the best way possible. This will ensure you have the right payment structure for success. This can mean increasing or decreasing payments (when the time is right to do so to protect your wealth) and reviewing your outside mortgage obligations with outside debt management.

Statistics have demonstrated most of us will have a life change, either by choice or not, prior to the maturity of the term. Because of this, it’s important to ensure you understand the difference in penalties associated with each lender. Ensuring the lowest exit cost from a mortgage is a large wealth-building tool when you need it most during an unexpected life change. Don’t make the mistake of thinking that the lowest rate contributes to that.

What’s the best advice REALTORS® can provide their clients?

Knowing what to expect for your income and down payment scenario is the easiest to review by ensuring you get completely pre-approved with the verification of those documents, not just a 60-second auto-approval. While most everything can be reviewed in advance, lenders always reserve the right to ask additional questions or get updated documentation.

Due diligence is a large part of the approval process. While the fundamentals of always getting your mortgage working for you with the lowest cost of borrowing will never change, life, products and circumstances do. Some items can be done upfront and others take place during an accepted offer. This is why the subject period is so important. It’s when the lenders will do the final verification of the property.

What’s the best way home buyers can avoid having their deal collapse due to financing?

The best way to have a deal not collapse is to be aware of what’s required for your specific circumstances, and prepare accordingly. While we can generalize, everyone’s journey is slightly different and has its own set of requirements. Part of this is done in the pre-approval process and the rest has to do with the specific property.

This could mean you may need to provide:

• Documents specific to your income within a timeframe for approval
• An appraisal (have an appraiser picked and ready to go)
• All documents related to the purchase price of the home
• Answers to any questions on the form B or related to any strata documents
• Assessments or special comments

Be prepared to answer those questions upon submission of your accepted offer and within the approval timeframe. Having these documents (and funds if you require an appraisal) will help avoid delays or surprises that may affect your deal.

You should also note if a price is re-negotiated. Make sure you’ve informed your mortgage professional about it in advance. Price and/or date changes alongside strata and/or homeowners’ insurance may also be a condition to the mortgage that could impact your approval.

Virtual fixture versus virtual chattel

One of the things I like best about our business (other than you, of course) is our unlimited creativity when it comes to dealing with the age-old task of getting properties listed, marketed, and sold. 

Getting clients on paper so they can realize their goal is what we’re all about. The many customers and clients we deal with come in all shapes, sizes, and temperaments. Their personalities, preferences, and foibles are limitless. Yet, they have much in common—for example, their reticence about making a decision for fear of making a mistake, and their comfort with the status quo. Combine these traits with those people who really don’t know what they want or partners who can’t agree on what to do, and it’s no surprise there’s a need, at the end of the day, to self-medicate with the poison of your choice.   

As REALTORS®, we’re also very creative when it comes to problem-solving the small and large bumps along the road to a making deal. What we like best is to have a suitable clause or a form to smooth things out. But having a standard form isn’t always the answer. 

I recall a now retired Council advisor lamenting about members with a “tick-box” mentality, the term she used for some members’ tendency to prefer a clause or a form as an antidote for any condition needing to be remedied. Not that she didn’t like the clauses and the blizzard of forms we use. Having been a Realtor and a broker herself, she understood licensees as well as anyone. Her concern was that some of us use forms without careful thought or worse—asking our clients to sign without adequately explaining them. As a result, they weren’t really giving their informed consent. But that’s a subject for another day. 

Clauses, notations, and forms do, indeed, have a place in our business. Imagine if we didn’t have standard forms. Every clause, form and deal would need to be bespoke and created from scratch, with considerable effort and risk. A time-consuming prospect indeed. What a world it would be. Which leads back to the topic of our creativity and our keenness for new ways of marketing properties: namely, the increasing popularity of virtual staging. Are there rules, forms, and clauses for that, too? 

First, let’s start with the basics and define “virtual staging,” which I think can be a useful marketing tool in your toolkit. Generally, it means using digital (or “virtual”) photos to show how a property can be decorated and furnished. If you Google the term, you’ll find a lot of really useful information on the website of the National Association of Realtors (the American equivalent of our Canadian Real Estate Association).  

There are a lot of benefits to virtual staging. Some buyers are blessed with an ability to look beyond a property’s clutter, shabby paint, and awful furniture, but many aren’t. I’m not being judgmental here—just practical. Let’s face it: most of us are used to what we have in our homes—whether that is scratched furniture from our pets, indelible reminders of a great party, or dad’s favourite worn-out comfy chair. To owners, these may just be lovable memories, some buyers can’t see past this stuff. 

With virtual staging, you get to clear everything out to create a canvas on which new furnishings and colours can be overlaid. The possibilities are endless, and the cost, I’m told, is a lot less than real staging. A dash of virtual staging might be just the thing to help your sellers put their property’s best foot forward, subject, of course, to your client’s informed consent and your brokerage’s policies (if any).  

Which takes us back to rules and forms. The Board does not have any specific rules regulating virtual staging, but it does have some general standards under the category of misrepresentation, which is central to a lot of complaints and legal actions. You don’t want to risk anyone thinking you’ve misrepresented a property with your virtual staging. It pays to be careful. 

Council’s general standards relevant to virtual staging are 4-7: False/Misleading Advertising and 3-4: Licensee Responsibility. As well, you need to adhere to the Real Estate Board’s REALTOR® Code of Ethics, Article 13: Advertising – Content/Accuracy and the Rules of Cooperation: Rule 3.06, Accuracy of Listing Information. 

To avoid someone levelling an accusation at you, I suggest you consider applying some advance risk management by writing a note in your listing’s Public/Internet Remarks, stating that the property has been virtually staged. No one is likely to be confused or to argue about virtual furnishings being included in the deal, but it  wouldn’t hurt to make clear that they are virtual.  

As well, since I’m told it’s also possible to change wall colour and flooring with virtual staging, if you do this to give an idea of how a room could look you definitely should note that the walls and flooring have been digitally enhanced. 

Here’s another idea: with room for up to 40 photos now possible in Paragon, why not consider having a few “before” and “after” pictures to help buyers get their creative juices flowing? 

Let’s not make that age-old conversation about fixture versus chattel more complicated by creating a problem with stuff that isn’t even there. 

So go ahead and take advantage of this great new tool to boost your sales of properties, but let’s not create a real problem with not-so-real (virtual) stuff. 

FINTRAC compliance made easier

Important FINTRAC guidance 

FINTRAC has issued new, temporary options for members unable to meet their reporting obligations because of COVID-19.  

Read more. 

FINTRAC fact sheet updated 

It can be challenging for members to comply with Canada’s complex Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) and Terrorist Financing Act  and regulations. To help you, here is our updated FINTRAC Fact sheet.  

Read more. 

Relicensing? Here’s what you need to know about Council courses

The Real Estate Council of BC (Council) requires you to complete three mandatory courses during your two-year licensing cycle for you to relicense. Here are the answers to some frequently asked questions.

Do Council’s required courses count for the Professional Development Program (PDP)?

No. These courses are mandatory for you to relicense, but are not a part of PDP and will not count for PDP hours.

Do I have to meet two educational obligations within my two-year licensing cycle?

Yes. You need to accrue 18 hours under PDP and complete Council’s three required courses.

What are Council’s required courses?

If your license expires before September 30, 2020, you need to complete these three courses:

• Legal Update
• Rule Changes: Agency and Disclosure
• Anti-Money Laundering in Real Estate

If your license expires on or after October 1, 2020, you need to complete these three courses:

• Legal Update
• Ethics in Real Estate 
• Anti-Money Laundering in Real Estate

Go to Council's website for more details on each of these courses.

Note that Council's just released information about its new Ethics in Real Estate course - click here to learn more.

How can I register for Council’s courses?

You can register online for any of Council’s courses. You can also call 1-877-927-2077 or email ce@recbc.ca.