The Washington Real Estate Commission voted on August 21, 2025 to approve the updated 2026-2027 Core Curriculum for the state's real estate licensing courses. The Education Subcommittee — led by Commissioner Shelley Schmitz — produced the new draft after multiple public listening sessions held in May and June 2025 and additional written feedback from several industry groups. The Commission's vote was unanimous among the commissioners present, with the final draft scheduled for completion in October 2025.
The most notable substantive addition: explicit instruction on transaction coordinators. The new curriculum incorporates the relevant statutory anchors that govern when a transaction coordinator's work crosses into licensed brokerage activity — specifically RCW 18.85.011(17)(a)-(h) (real estate services) and RCW 18.86.020 (agency relationships). The Transaction Coordinator Subcommittee also recommended that DOL and Washington Realtors collaborate on educational training videos on the same topic.
For approved pre-license course providers, the new curriculum sets the content map for instruction beginning in 2026. For practicing brokers, it signals where the Commission expects working knowledge to be sharpest: agency-law application around the use of non-licensed transaction coordinators is a current enforcement concern. Broker firms using transaction coordinators should review their workflows against the cited RCWs. The full discussion is in the August 21, 2025 Commission meeting transcript; for ongoing updates, monitor the Real Estate Commission page.
Date Created: May 27, 2026House Bill 1552 raises the per-license fee on Washington real estate brokers from $10 to $20, with the additional revenue dedicated to funding the Washington Center for Real Estate Research. The bill also indexes the fee for inflation in future cycles. The Real Estate Commission held a special meeting on July 28, 2025 to approve the increase, and the Department of Licensing's operating system, forms, and website were updated to reflect the new fee shortly after.
Operational support staff reported at the Commission's August 21, 2025 meeting that rulemaking on the change was expected to become effective around mid-September 2025. After that effective date, every license issuance and renewal carries the $20 fee. The Research Center, housed at the University of Washington and previously funded on a smaller and less predictable basis, will use the dedicated stream to expand its statewide housing market reports, census data analysis, and annual income reports — tools that brokerages and individual licensees can use for market-trend education and CMA work.
For brokers, the practical takeaway is a modest cost increase at renewal plus better-funded statewide market research over time. The full discussion of the implementation appears in the August 21, 2025 Real Estate Commission meeting transcript on the DOL site; the Real Estate Commission page indexes all the agendas, audio, and transcripts for past and upcoming meetings.
Date Created: May 27, 2026Governor Bob Ferguson signed three significant housing bills from the 2026 legislative session, all carrying an effective date of June 11, 2026. Together they continue Washington's three-year push to widen what's legal to build, where, and at what density — following HB 1110 (2023) and the 2025 lot-splitting reform.
SB 6026 — the centerpiece — requires local governments with populations over 30,000 to allow housing in commercial and mixed-use zones. It also limits jurisdictions' ability to mandate ground-floor commercial in more than 40% of their total commercial-or-mixed-use acreage, with carve-outs for industrial zones, transit station areas, and historic landmarks. The bill passed with broad bipartisan support: 35-14 in the Senate, 69-27 in the House. For brokers, this is a meaningful expansion of where residential development can pencil — many commercial parcels that previously had no residential entitlement path now qualify for housing.
HB 2266 creates statewide permitting standards for permanent supportive housing, transitional housing, and emergency housing (STEP housing), ensuring this housing type can be built faster and more predictably across jurisdictions. HB 2304, sponsored by Rep. Jamila Taylor (D-Federal Way), expands the existing condo-style multiplex allowance to four-story buildings, making small multiplex development financially feasible for owner-developers who want to build and sell the units as condos rather than rent them. The official announcement from the Governor's office is here; a practitioner-oriented summary lives at SJA Property Management's 2026 housing supply overview.
Date Created: May 27, 2026