RPA Anguish

Been over a month since I posted about the new RPA. There are RPA courses, lots of RPA courses and the agents are repeatedly told that without the courses they cannot possibly understand the contract. As I wrote earlier--where does that leave the Buyers and Sellers? Do they get a course? There will be a booklet produced to explain things to the principals--and conveniently available at a cost. Buyers and Sellers should ask their agent for one, unless the buyers and sellers are attorneys (maybe even then).

The money involved in the courses is pretty impressive. Costs for the 4 hour version range upwards of $50 a head. Do the math--275 agents @ $50 = $13,750. Hey, that's real money. In metro areas with bigger venues we're talking serious money. Then there's face to face webinar formats--that cost as much--and enable one "teacher" to rake in a huge amount of money from all over the state. Sounds like a clever plan. Produce a new RPA lacking clarity in content, then charge money to the people who paid the dues that supported the RPA creation process to explain the form to them so they can attempt to educate the public who really just want to buy or sell a house. At the same time all the trade organization faithful infer at every opportunity that without the course, understanding is well nigh impossible for agents or the public.

The Standard Forms Committee is made up volunteers--free labor in evaluating the suggestions and comments. Legal staff and support staff are well paid, but the amount of volunteer time contributed pushes the business model into a sector well separated from that of typical businesses. Not surprisingly there is no bona fide competition from other forms firms--paying for all the hours it takes to produce a new RPA would be prohibitively expensive for a stand alone business. SOOO--if you want a simple, easy to understand version of the RPA for a straightforward transaction--you're out of luck unless you insist that your attorney draft one. One size fits all because the trade organization says it does.

No, I did not go to an RPA course. I read through the new RPA several times in a half hour and compared it to the old version. There's no compelling reason to revise the old version based on the changes--IMHO. There are some gems of convoluted verbiage in the new one, but it says what it says. The attorneys who end up studying the new RPA in the course of disputes will be reading the words, not depending on course content. The buyers and sellers will be reading the words--if they read them at all. Going to a course to listen to legal staff explain what they really meant or learning their intent in changing previous wording is not relevant to the real world of contract creation. Woulda, shoulda, coulda doesn't count. Such commentary is interesting if you're a legal scholar curious about real estate purchase agreement evolution. I'm not. The buyers and sellers are not. The plaintiff's attorneys are not. The new RPA says what it says.

I will definitely buy booklets written for the public to give to my clients because they repesent a reasonable attempt to educate the public about the contract they are being asked to execute. I can buy several booklets for the price of one course. If I went to several versions of the RPA course, I'd still do the same thing. The booklets are usually much more clearly written that the RPA itself (I think they hire professional writers to distill the legaleese). Now if the folks who write the booklets would write the RPA we'd all be in a better situation--except for the trial attorneys and the trade organization. Wonder if there's some special significance there--LOL!