MN REALTOR® Ads Encourage Buyers to Call You

Thanks to action taken by the MN REALTORS® Board of Directors, you will soon begin hearing a series of radio ads encouraging first-time home buyers to utilize the services of a REALTOR® when buying a home. The $500,000 campaign is the largest single campaign in Association history.

Authorized by the Minnesota Association of REALTORS® Board of Directors in March, the ads are designed to spur housing transactions and help REALTORS® during a slight market downturn. The MN REALTORS® Board of Directors discussed what actions the Association could take to benefit our members at a time when listing inventories are significantly higher. The Board decided to focus on first-time home buyers as the best way to grow housing sales throughout the state.

First-time homebuyers are over 40 percent of the residential real estate marketplace. Demographically they are between the ages of 22 and 34, usually married or engaged. A rapidly growing market of first-time homebuyers is single women between 25 and 35. The MN REALTORS® Board of Directors recognized that when first-time buyers leave the market it has a significant effect on all housing transactions.

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Minnesota Legislative Activities - Rounding the Corner

With roughly a month left in the Minnesota Legislatures Session, your MN REALTOR® lobbyists - Glenn Dorfman and Susan Dioury - are following a number of issues on your behalf. Below is a brief list of the issues, Bill numbers and the Association's position.

Eminent Domain (SF 2750 - Bakk/ HF 2846 - Johnson)

Legislation focuses on the definition of public purpose and defines when a condemning authority can take property by eminent domain. The bill has been significantly modified as it has made its way through the Committee process. This bill has passed in the Senate and the bill contains provisions including the definition of "abandoned property", "blighted area", "structurally substandard", "environmentally contaminated area" and "public use; public purpose". The bill states that a condemning authority may not take private property by eminent domain unless it is for:

1. the possession, occupation, ownership and enjoyment of the land by the general public or by public agencies;
2. the creation or functioning of a public service corporation;
3. mitigation of a blighted area, remediation of an environmentally contaminated area, reduction of abandoned property or removal of a public nuisance; or
4. the provision of physical or financial assistance to a governmental unit or nonprofit organization that provides emergency shelter and services for homeless person in a first class city.

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