Real estate professionals will be spending more time in the classroom after new state laws go into effect later this year.

State legislators rewrote real estate licensing laws during the 2007 legislative session, changing the regulations for the first time since the rules were originally drafted in 1925. In 2008, Gov. Christine Gregoire signed the changes into law, making them effective on July 1, 2010.

The reason for the law updates, according the Washington State Department of Licensing, is, “Much of (the law) had been enacted over 60 years ago, and the ever-widening gulf between present-day practice and the law as written made it difficult for practitioners to obey the law and for us to enforce it.”

Department of Licensing spokeswoman Christine Anthony said generally speaking, the laws require more education for agents and brokers, both when they are first entering the profession and when they are renewing their licenses.

Also, she said, the terminology is being tweaked as well. What previously was the salesperson license will be called a broker license, and the associate broker license will be a managing broker license.

A new salesperson currently needs 60 hours of coursework on real estate fundamentals and pass the state real estate examination. After July 1, a new salesperson – now termed a broker – will have to take the same 60 hours of classes on fundamentals and 30 hours of training in real estate practices before being allowed to take the exam.

Managing brokers will need to have 90 hours of training before they can take their state exam. Their classes will involve real estate broker management, business management and advanced real estate law.

Existing real estate professionals who renew their licenses after July 1 will be required to take what’s being termed a transition course.

In addition, all real estate professionals will be required to undergo a fingerprint background check through the Washington State Patrol and the FBI. Anthony said those will have to be completed every six years moving forward.

The new laws are the culmination of a process that started seven years ago when the Department of Licensing assembled a 30-person task force that was charged with the challenge of updating the licensing requirements. That task force included real estate commissioners, real estate brokers and agents, real estate attorneys and representatives of a number of state agencies, including the Department of Consumer Affairs and the Attorney General’s Office.

The group weeded through inconsistencies in the current law to come up with what’s expected to be a more realistic guideline for the real estate industry moving forward.

While the laws are slated to go into effect on July 1, the Department of Licensing has a public hearing planned in Olympia to hear comments on real estate rules. That hearing is currently scheduled for Feb. 9.

For more information on the hearing and the new rules, go to www.dol.wa.gov/business/realestate.