Committees are formed to work for a host of needs and reasons to help their organization. The key word is work. The reason that many committees break down is that committee members don’t realize that there is real work, hard work, to be done. Committee meetings are not social occasions. They are not just gatherings [...]

Your May article on mandatory continuing education rightly pointed out the advantages of online courses. I was disappointed to see, however, that the Ontario Real Estate Association was not mentioned as a major provider of such courses.
OREA was a pioneer in the provision of online education, offering its Phase One course online as early as [...]

Competition laws regarding price fixing are in place to prevent monopolies and lack of choices. The MLS system, however, is just one of many marketing vehicles. To place a minimum rate for advertising on the MLS does not impair choice in any way.
I personally advocate a minimum ad rate of three per cent to the [...]

Re: Would you let me advertise your listings (Metes & Bounds by Marty Douglas, April):
I guess we are all entitled to our bad‑hair‑day now and then, and this one was yours!
I’ve saved (for about 25 years now) an incredibly stern warning from Council back then headlined, in great bold print, NEVER ON SUNDAY.  We (remember?) [...]

Two days after the Ides of March, on the Seventeenth of Ireland, I facilitated a panel presentation to a Leadership Conference of the B.C. Real Estate Association. A cross-section of “experts” addressed the issue, “Where to from here?”
Based on what I can decipher from the shredded cocktail napkin found in my suit three weeks [...]

John Toole, former partner of P.J. Toole & Cote Real Estate Ltd., a prominent and respected real estate brokerage company in Calgary, died  May 9 at the age of 68 years.
Mr. Toole was president of the Calgary Real Estate Board, the Alberta Real Estate Board and FIABCI Canada, and he was a director of the [...]

After 15 years with the B.C. Real Estate Association, Robin Hill is retiring as executive officer.
“We’ve been through a lot together, and this association and our industry are continuing to change, but I’m looking for some new challenges,” says Hill.  “It’s the right time to help the association make the transition to someone else, and [...]

The new minister who governs real estate in Ontario jumped into the frontline trenches to learn the business first-hand, taking an extensive tour of a brokerage office in Sudbury. The Ontario Real Estate Association and the Sudbury Real Estate Board organized the visit, at the request of Tim Hudak, Ontario’s newly appointed Minister of Consumer [...]

The Hamilton-Burlington and District Real Estate Board was presented with the Canadian Public Relations Society‑Hamilton Chapter (CPRS) Pinnacle Award for its Realtors Without Borders Trade Show. Held in October 2001, the show introduced a new suite of software to its members and encouraged and increased overall usage of board software. Dozens of exhibit booths and [...]

The Toronto Real Estate Board (TREB) has gone wireless. As part of a licensing agreement with Ericsson Canada, who designed, built and is hosting the application, TREB members who subscribe to the Rogers AT&T Wireless network will be able to access MLS databases and real estate listing information through Internet browsers in wireless phones and [...]