Inman

Clarification

In an Aug. 30, 2006, article, “Company seeks ruling on real estate pay advances,” Inman News has added some context to clarify a statement in the original article. The new text reads:

Vernon L. Jarboe, a partner with the law firm Sloan Eisenbarth Glassman McEntire & Jarboe LLC, said he filed the brief on behalf of the Kansas Association of Realtors. “From a broker’s perspective, you cannot successfully supervise salespeople if you don’t know when or how much they are getting paid. Assigning an as-yet-unearned commission interferes with the broker’s supervisory role,” he said, adding that a broker can’t properly supervise a salesperson if the agent “is getting paid in ways (the broker) can’t know or understand.”

Real estate license law forbids brokers from paying a commission to anyone other than a real estate licensee affiliated with the broker or to another broker, he also said. But the district court found that the real estate law relating to the assignment of real estate commissions was “inapplicable to the case at hand.” The “clear intent” of that real estate law, according to the court, “was not to prohibit assignment of commissions: it was to prohibit brokers from paying someone who is not licensed as a real estate agent for selling real estate.”