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The past year has been a tumultuous one for the National Association of Realtors, and 2025 promises to be no different.
The 1.5 million member trade group has its priorities for the new year. NAR will focus on housing affordability and availability, member empowerment and consumer protection, an NAR spokesperson told Inman.
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“We will advocate for policies to increase housing inventory through tax incentives, improve access to homeownership, ensure equal access to professional representation, and expand economic opportunities,” the spokesperson said in a statement.
But these priorities will have to exist alongside everything else NAR will be dealing with next year: falling membership; disputes surrounding its nationwide antitrust settlement; continued commission litigation from homebuyers; lawsuits challenging policies around membership, pocket listings and access to multiple listing services; fallout from misconduct allegations; budget cuts and complaints about spending; and competition from rival trade group, the American Real Estate Association.
Kendall Bonner
According to Kendall Bonner, vice president of industry relations at eXp Realty, the philosophy behind NAR’s priorities in 2025 will likely remain unchanged “with a continued focus on trust, advocacy and education.”
But, given the trade group’s many challenges, that doesn’t mean how it implements its priorities should stay the same, Bonner indicated.
“[H]ow they execute on these principles will need to shift to include greater transparency, increased communication, proactive risk mitigation (as opposed to reactive), as well as improved media and industry relationships,” Bonner told Inman in a statement.
Expected membership drop
In November, NAR announced that, as of Oct. 31, its membership stood at 1,526,631 and is on track to end 2024 with the trade group’s fourth-highest membership count in its 116-year history, down about 2 percent from 2023.
NAR expects its membership will fall to 1.4 million in 2025. Asked why, NAR’s spokesperson pointed to the real estate market.
“Membership shifts typically lag the market by one to two years,” the spokesperson said.
“Tight inventory and rising interest rates since 2022 have led to projected membership declines. With fewer market opportunities, this can result in some people leaving the business.”
James Dwiggins
James Dwiggins, CEO of real estate franchisor NextHome, agreed there will likely be fewer Realtors in 2025, “mostly due to general attrition in the industry and the market continuing to be tough.”
“I’m sure some percentage will be people unhappy with NAR as well,” Dwiggins added.
In 2023 and 2024, allegations of harassment, intimidation and retaliation at NAR have permeated the industry zeitgeist, adding to the trade group’s already substantial troubles.
Asked about the potential consequences of these misconduct allegations in 2025, NAR’s spokesperson said, “Our new leadership has undertaken a comprehensive review of our policies and procedures and continues to work every day to help NAR employees feel respected and supported.
“We are committed to these ongoing initiatives to strengthen our organization, enhance our culture, and promote accountability.”
Bonner suggested NAR membership could decline “due to economic challenges, reputation concerns, or competition from the American Real Estate Association.”
However, she expects NAR’s three-way agreement, which requires agents and brokers to join at all three levels of membership — local, state and national — if they want to join any Realtor association, and NAR’s “close ties to most MLSs” to buoy membership.
“While some agents may leave the industry due to financial challenges or retirement, these departures are often offset by new agents entering the field, drawn by the promise of career opportunities in real estate,” Bonner said.
“It is important to note that there is extreme value to real estate professionals in the local and state associations with regard to forms, legal hotlines and education, which is a key component to membership.”
Still, it will be difficult to assess much about NAR’s membership numbers if those numbers are not available. Earlier this year, NAR scrubbed decades of membership data from its website, keeping it from both members and the public.
While the trade group said at the time that the scrubbed data would be available to members again at some point in the future, that point has yet to arrive and NAR’s action has contributed to a lack of trust among membership.
Phillip Cantrell
“Frankly, I’m not sure NAR is telling us the truth about membership numbers,” Phillip Cantrell, founder of Benchmark Realty, told Inman in a statement.
“As you know, they removed them from the website earlier this year when all this heated up with companies like Redfin removing the requirement to be a member.”
Cantrell speculated that if agents and brokers are no longer required to belong to Realtor associations for MLS access in 2025 — which could happen either through current or future litigation, pressure from the Department of Justice, or changes in MLS rules — NAR’s “numbers will drop like a stone.”
If membership dips, so does NAR’s revenue
Fewer members means less revenue for NAR, which is heavily dependent on membership dues. The membership decline is expected at the same time that NAR is digging deep into its coffers and making tens of millions of dollars in budget cuts to pay for its $418 million antitrust settlement.
Asked about the potential consequences of this belt-tightening, NAR emphasized that its local and state Realtor associations will help take up the slack.
“NAR is committed to streamlining operations while aligning with our mission to serve members and protect consumers,” NAR’s spokesperson said.
“We will enhance collaboration with local and state associations to address challenges and seize opportunities, ensuring Realtors have the necessary resources and support.”
Bonner suggested that how NAR manages its budget constraints will be key.
“Potential threats are reduced services, reduced staffing, and risk to reputation,” she said.
“Therefore, if educated members believe that value has declined, those members may look to other options. However, the key will be the leadership of brokers, local/state associations, and the MLSs.”
‘Simmering enemies’ post-settlement
That broker leadership regarding NAR’s value may depend on how the chips fell during the negotiations of NAR’s antitrust settlement. In order to secure the deal, NAR left brokerages with a sales volume of more than $2 billion in 2022 out in the cold.
That, according to Cantrell, means NAR has a lot to make up for in 2025.
“The NAR settlement abandoned the largest 92+/- brokers in the country, who ended up paying millions from their own P&Ls, effectively turning these brokerages into simmering enemies,” he said.
“Every single one of them. NAR is going to have to proactively find a way to make those brokerages whole, or they will become aggressive.
“Should that become a collective movement, that will be a VERY serious problem for NAR. These businesses have shareholder investors who couldn’t care less about NAR’s posturing and are looking to be made whole for the damage that NAR has caused them.”
Cantrell’s solution was dramatic.
“[E]very single penny not required for operational expenses should be dividends back to the membership, including full liquidation and distribution of all of SCV’s assets,” he said, referring to NAR’s for-profit investment subsidiary Second Century Ventures.
“Sell the [NAR] buildings and lease them back. Cut staff by at least one-third and get rid of ALL the perks. In other words, start running it like a business in crisis because it is!”
NAR’s value proposition
While Dwiggins, whose company was a member of that “$2 billion club,” did not express such hostility toward NAR, he agreed with Bonner and Cantrell that NAR’s approach to transparency will shape how members see the association.
“I think they need to come out and explain all the things that they’re doing,” Dwiggins said.
“They haven’t done a good enough job of trying to open up the books to say, ‘We’ve made all of these changes’ because without that transparency, people just make assumptions.”
He said he’s gotten to know NAR’s CEO, Nykia Wright, and said it was a “smart decision” to appoint someone from outside the industry as the organization’s leader.
“It’s fresh eyes from a different sector, going, ‘We can’t do things this way,’” Dwiggins told Inman.
“She’s making lots of changes. Over the next six months, you’ll see NAR make a lot of moves.”
If NAR can be more transparent, gain the confidence of their members back, and articulate their value differently than they do now, “I think NAR is here for the long term,” Dwiggins added.
‘Forced’ membership
But according to Cantrell, NAR’s value is not currently apparent to the vast majority of its members, many of whom he says feel “thoroughly alienated” by NAR’s three-way agreement and the requirement of many MLSs that subscribers become Realtors.
“If you were to poll my 1,720 agents, 98 percent would say that the only value of association membership is access to the MLS,” he said.
Because of that latter requirement, most members feel “forced” to belong to NAR in order to access the MLS, according to Cantrell.
“I often hear the word ‘handcuffed’ used here,” he said.
“No one likes to feel mandated, or forced into anything, so without a proper explanation of value, resentment naturally builds. That’s where we are today.”
Cantrell connected NAR’s financial security to these controversial rules requiring Realtor membership — rules that are currently being challenged in antitrust lawsuits against the trade group.
“[T]hey will do anything and say anything to secure their revenue streams, which is why they will never relinquish control and ownership in the MLSs to operate as for-profit businesses, and why they will never eliminate the three-way agreement,” Cantrell said.
He would like to see excess and redundancies at all three levels of association membership eliminated.
“For example, we have SEVEN local associations in Middle Tennessee and I’m sure about 25 in the entire state,” Cantrell said.
“It’s ridiculous and just no longer functions.”
He believes NAR probably has “a window of opportunity” to win back the membership, but it will “take clear and beneficial action.”
“Otherwise, once association membership becomes optional, NAR is done and it’s every man and woman for themselves,” Cantrell said.
He stressed that NAR should be focusing only on three things: political advocacy, education, and data collection and dissemination.
“When any business fails to deliver sufficient value in the mind of the consumer, that consumer turns elsewhere or does without,” he said.
“History is littered with the carcasses of companies that ignored that fact. Why should the associations be different?”
NAR declined to comment on the future outcomes of legal issues.
Competition from a rival trade group
Whatever NAR’s fate in 2025, the experts Inman reached out to predicted the American Real Estate Association would not play a determinative role.
“I don’t think AREA will have much impact,” Dwiggins said.
Cantrell agreed, calling the trade group, which was founded in the wake of the misconduct allegations at NAR in 2023, “[m]ore of an adjunct than a replacement.”
“They may be emotional competition, but I don’t think they are a fully viable competitor yet,” Cantrell said.
“I just don’t see them having the legs anytime soon that NAR already has, which if reorganized and utilized effectively, is very valuable. Nice guys, but I don’t see it.”
NAR itself told Inman the association “thrives in a competitive environment” and is “committed to leading with diverse perspectives.”
“Our advocacy efforts focus on homeownership access, housing inventory, affordable housing programs, and fair housing,” the spokesperson said.
“We deliver unmatched value through industry leadership, innovative tools, educational opportunities, and comprehensive benefits.”
According to Bonner, in order to be a true contender, the American Real Estate Association will need to attract brokers and MLSs by positioning itself as “a more ethical and member-focused alternative” to NAR.
“The AREA will also need to set itself apart by offering a more modern approach to agent advocacy and consumer education, while simultaneously enhancing member benefits,” Bonner said.
“However, the more important question is why would a brokerage move from NAR to AREA membership.
“Unless AREA can clearly articulate their significantly different and improved value proposition to brokers, the impact to NAR will likely not be meaningful.”
Email Andrea V. Brambila.
