Real estate whack-a-mole and the never-ending consumer protection battle

People assume I catch everything in this industry because I’m chronically online. The truth is less flattering to my willpower and more flattering to my community: If I miss something, someone’s already emailing it to me, sliding into my DMs or telling me what actually happened behind closed doors. I am seeing what’s being advertised to consumers, what providers are saying about themselves online and have buyers and sellers telling me directly about their own experiences.

It feels like real estate whack-a-mole, every single day. My office might as well be at Dave & Buster’s with the constant noise, flashing lights, someone always trying to win you a prize that costs more than it’s worth. One problem goes down, another one (or another lawsuit) pops up. It’s a constant stream of issues and challenges that, for once, my ADHD superpower of handling multitasking and distraction comes in handy for.

But beyond the noisy lawsuits and corporate puffery tucked into every social media post, influencer campaign and the industry articles shoved into my inbox ten times a day, there are other issues out there that don’t get that same attention. Consumer advocacy work isn’t sexy or attention-grabbing, but it’s worth listening to if you care about your clients’ well-being and their wallet. So, here’s some insight into what I am seeing, what I’m watching and why it matters.

Lenders

Some of you are already getting emails offering to pay you to sell home equity investment products to clients who “might not qualify for a traditional refi or HELOC.” In our opinion, the wording is what it sounds like: “products of last resort.” Home equity investments (HEIs) remain largely unregulated federally, and with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) gutted, states are scrambling to figure out basic guardrails. These products can run twice the effective cost of a HELOC, and the fine print usually means that if a homeowner can’t buy back their equity stake within ten years, they’re forced to sell or take out another loan. 

If you’re offering these, you owe clients a plain-English walk-through of all of their options, and if they still move forward, you should review all of the terms and make sure they know about the massive balloon payment that will come due. Caring about your client’s outcome shouldn’t have an expiration date that lines up suspiciously well with your commission clearing.

Then there’s the mortgage “broker” who isn’t shopping anything. I once assumed a broker’s whole job was comparing lenders. Adorable, right? Hunterbrook Media found that more than 8,600 loan officers sent United Wholesale Mortgage over 99% of their business in 2023 — double the number who did the same in 2020. 

It became the subject of a Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) and Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act (RESPA) lawsuit alleging borrowers paid hundreds of millions, possibly billions, more in closing costs as a result. When I bring this up, someone always says, “Well, that lender just closes faster.”  So, out of the hundreds of lenders out there, there is only one in the entire US that can close fast?  That math ain’t mathing.

What’s worse is that there is an entire Facebook group of brokers debating whether to work with Rocket or UWM.  At what point did mortgage brokers decide to let a corporation they don’t work for dictate who they send clients to? By the way, it’s not a badge of honor when you post about reaching a certain status with a lender, because all that tells me is that you likely aren’t shopping around for your clients as much as you should be.  

Appraisers

Uniform Appraisal Dataset (UAD) 3.6 becomes mandatory on November 2, 2026, and it’s a full restructuring of how appraisal reports are built, including more data and more time. Lenders, if you haven’t talked to your appraisal management company (AMC) about readiness, you’re setting yourself up for closing delays this fall. “We didn’t see it coming” is a rough look when the calendar has said this date for over a year.

Speaking of AMCs, their fees deserve scrutiny too, especially with “affordability” in the news weekly. Appraisal Regulation Compliance Council (ARCC) data showed that AMCs inflated appraisal costs by $15 billion from 2013 to 2023, a period during which appraiser pay barely moved. 

A handful of states are pushing for an itemized appraiser invoice to be given to the buyer. Other states do not seem to think they are responsible for regulating these giants. So who is to blame when consumers start asking where that $12 billion went?

Real estate agents

In my opinion, referral fees deserve the same scrutiny lead-gen platforms got in other industries. Angie’s List paid $1.4 million to settle a lawsuit alleging it ranked contractors by who paid the most, not who did the best work. 

If a home-services platform can get sued for that, why do real estate referral arrangements marketed as “free” or “no pay-to-play” while quietly kicking back 30%+ of what you pay get so little scrutiny?  You can “analyze millions of transactions,” but if the deciding factor of who you pair a consumer with is based on whether they pay you a fee, a consumer should know that.  

Admin fees are having their moment in the courtroom sun. If you need a script to explain a fee you already charge, or avoid it because it’s uncomfortable to explain, that should tell you right then and there you shouldn’t be charging it. In mystery-shopper calls, agent after agent told me, “don’t worry, the seller pays,” but the seller doesn’t always pay and often ends up covering their own agent’s fee on top of it. You can’t preach affordability and tack on fees in the same breath. Pick a lane.

There are a million articles out about pocket listings, so I won’t go too far into the industry’s turf war over who controls inventory, because that’s what it’s really about, not consumer rights. I will just say this: In all my years of watching what consumers say online (and they say a lot of things), I never noticed complaints about their home being displayed everywhere.  

And to round this out, let’s close on the accountability gap. My own research comparing state disciplinary records found a state with 50,000 agents had fewer violations posted last year than a state with just 5,000 agents. Either the bigger state is squeaky clean, or consumers aren’t being given the whole picture before they hire someone. 

A few states haven’t updated their records since last year.  Other states don’t display disciplinary actions on the individual license, while others just post a PDF that you have to search through every month. If you are a state-run organization meant to protect the public, ensuring consumers know who they are working with should be a top priority.  

None of this should surprise you, but it’s a wake-up call: Consumers are facing real issues that hit their wallets and shape not only their experience but also their perception of the industry. This is stuff I look at daily and ask not only if these practices are harming consumers, but how to fix them.   

The whack-a-mole game just started another round, so I will leave you with this: You don’t need a lobbying group to speak up. Pennsylvania got a bill regulating HEIs because I walked into my state rep’s office and asked what we could do. That’s the whole origin story; granted, I have a great state representative, and not sure I can say the same for everyone. But the reality is that sometimes you just need to ask the questions the industry doesn’t want asked out loud.

Wendy Gilch is a consumer advocate and thought leader in residential real estate and Founder of Selling Later. 
This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of HousingWire’s editorial department and its owners. To contact the editor responsible for this piece: [email protected].