Exposing Hate & Discrimination In The Real Estate World

  Remax posted a Pride Month post. Many of their agents did not like that very much as we can see in the screen caps below. 

  What exactly is it about rainbows that pushes so many people over the edge?  I want to thank EXP Realty for supporting Pride. As one of the brokerages with the largest agent count, this really does mean a lot. But they need to do something about many of their agents.  Lots of these comments are near the line without crossing over, but the intent is clear, to express their anger at EXP support for a marginalized community. 

 Peter Silvester is an agent with Fathom Realty and looks like he owns a 1031 intermediary, 1031now.com. His profile has tons of crazy conspiracy theories on it, but we are solely interested in his homophobic posts as they violate 10-5.

Jessica Horton of Jessica Horton & Associates is not a Realtor. She is a real estate broker in the state of Georgia. She says that belonging to NAR is "antithetical to my core values." One of these core values she upholds is the belief that agents should be able to allow racists symbols in the photographs of the property she is selling. She believes that creating a market place for people of all colors to be free from discrimination apparently is "tyrannical." I want to make it clear though, I have no issue with someone not being a member of NAR based on ethical reasons.  I do have a problem though when that ethical reason is the promotion of racism and the belief that that should be allowed in the real estate market.  Not surprisingly Georgia is a state that has no Fair Housing continuing education requirements  

 On the same NAR Pride post that they posted to all their channels, which we posted about before....even on Linkedin the hate continues. You would think maybe on Linkedin people might try to hide their hate. But nope, not there either.

  NAR posting this graphic certainly set people off on Instagram. Here are a few of the comments on the post. Katie McDermott  RealNet Brokerage Tampa, FL Unclear if this is a Real Estate Agent Kimberly Vining Remax Southerm Griffin, GA Ruth Monk Blount Peeler Properties Tallahassee, FL Jonathon Brubaker Edgewater Realty Houston/Galveston, TX Ashley Duran  Set In Stone Realty  Phoenix, AZ

  Here you can see Pedro Cordova using absolutely vile hate speech. This is not some gray area. He is way past the line and clearly in violation of 10-5. We will be alerting both his brokerage, local and state associations. We will update you as to how that turns out.

  NAR put a Pride Month post on their Facebook page.  There were 34 angry emoji reactions to it, and 6 that found it funny. Obviously this lends to the question....does an Emoji reaction to a post constitute hate speech under 10-5? I honestly do not know. But what I do know is that from these reactions we know what is in the hearts and minds of these individuals. It would behoove us to scroll through these individuals social media posts. There is 250 total comments on the page. Right around 10% of the posts were homophobic or expressing hate towards the LGBTQ+ community. I will note Mr Bowen does state in the comments he is not a Realtor member.  We have seen his discriminatory posts in several places on Facebook. It is a real shame though, because I hope people do not confuse him with his brother who is an agent as well...from whom I have never seen a discriminatory post.

 

  A common piece of propaganda that people use is trying to paint LGBTQ+ individuals as grooming or sexualizing children. Here we see a common example of this type of gaslighting. Just some happy children running through a rainbow elicits such hate from this individual. 

 Article 10 protects both gender identity and sexual orientation. Let's take a look at some possible examples of hate speech from Realtors against these protected classes.  

What is hate speech?  Is it one of those things that you simply know when you see it?  Well for an enforcement of a rule in a trade organization, something as subjective as that will not really fly.   Thankfully someone thought of this ahead of time. NAR has actual guidance on what constitutes hate speech, and how to properly interpret and apply 10-5. You can find the guidance here .  In their guidance they try to make this as simple as possible. They simply use the Merriam Webster dictionary definition of hate speech, epithets and slurs.            "In similar fashion, Merriam Webster’s Dictionary defines “hate speech,” “epithets,”                     and “slurs” as follows: Hate Speech : “speech that is intended to insult, offend, or intimidate a person because of some trait (as race, religion, sexual orientation, national origin, or disability).” Epithet : “1a: a characterizing word or phrase accompanying or occurring in place of the name of a person or thing;  b:  a disparagin

 The National Association of Realtors is the largest trade association in the country. They represent real estate agents, brokers, as well as certain affiliated professions.  In order to join this organization one has to agree to their Code of Ethics.  Article 10 of their Code of Ethics states:      "Article 10 REALTORS® shall not deny equal professional services to any person for reasons of race,           color, religion, sex, disability, familial status, national origin, sexual orientation, or gender identity.           REALTORS® shall not be parties to any plan or agreement to discriminate against a person or persons        on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, disability, familial status, national origin, sexual orientation,           or gender identity. (Amended 1/23) REALTORS®, in their real estate employment practices, shall not           discriminate against any person or persons on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, disability, familial        status, nationa