Knoxville Tennessee home buying legalities
If you’re considering buying a home in the greater Knoxville Tennessee area (or anywhere in Tennessee for that matter), there are some legal requirements imposed on all Tennessee real estate licensees by our real estate commission.
The first requirement is that all Tennessee real estate licensees MUST (this is not an option) disclose their agency status at the first “substantive contact” with a prospective consumer of real estate services. The default status is called facilitator which is a non agency status.
You can read all about what a Tennessee licensee’s duties to you are here.
That means if you call and just ask the price or location of a house, that’s probably not a “substantive contact” and does not require any sort of disclosures; but if you meet with a licensee and talk about buying a particular house that would probably qualify as “substantive contact”.
Before this disclosure of agency status takes places all Tennessee real estate licensees MUST obey the following: “EVERY REAL ESTATE LICENSEE SHALL MAINTAIN THE CONFIDENTIALITY OF ANY INFORMATION RECEIVED FROM YOU BY THE LICENSEE PRIOR TO THE LICENSEE’S DISCLOSURE TO YOU OR A WRITTEN AGENCY OR SUBAGENCY AGREEMENT TO REPRESENT ANYONE IN A TRANSACTION TO WHICH YOU MAY BE A PARTY, EXCEPT FOR ADVERSE FACTS REQUIRED TO BE DISCLOSED UNDER TENNESSEE LAW.”
Unless you have a signed & written agency agreement where you actually hire a Tennessee real estate licensee to be your agent in a transaction their status is most likely the default status in Tennessee which is a non-agency status called facilitator.
Additionally not all Tennessee licensees are REALTORS®
A REALTOR® is a member of the National Association of REALTORS® and subscribes to their strict Code of Ethics .
For the very best representation, buying or selling your next Knoxville area home make sure your Tennessee real estate licensee, is not only a REALTOR® but also YOUR agent in order to get the very best representation.
* IMPORTANT * A disclosure of agency form is not an agency agreement. An agency agreement spells out the terms of your agent’s employment by your and must be signed by both you and your agent.
A “Confirmation of Agency” form, which is a disclosure form, IS NOT an agency agreement.
Please call or email me with any agency or real estate questions.
See all of Knoxville’s Realtor listings at KnoxvilleHomecenter.com