Virginia Real Estate Broker Exam — All Questions

The Virginia Residential Property Disclosure Statement required by Section 55.1-703 takes which approach to the condition of the home?

• a.The owner warrants the condition of every component
• b.The owner certifies the home will pass an inspection
• c.The owner advises the buyer to exercise due diligence✓
• d.The owner is excused from disclosing anything at all

Subsection A of Section 55.1-703 says the owner furnishes the statement "for the buyer to beware of certain matters that may affect the buyer's decision to purchase such real property," and every item in subsection B is framed as the owner making no representation and the purchaser being advised to exercise whatever due diligence that purchaser deems necessary. A warranty is the opposite posture, and so is a certification that the property will pass inspection; both would convert a notice into a promise the statute never asks the owner to make. Nor is the owner excused from disclosing, because the statement itself must be delivered and separate affirmative disclosures survive, including the military air installation noise zone disclosure in Section 55.1-704. The nineteen enumerated items include resource protection areas under a locality's Chesapeake Bay Preservation Act ordinance, special flood hazard areas, radon zones and defective drywall.

A Virginia home sits in a locality with a military air installation. What does Section 55.1-704 require of the owner?

• a.Nothing, since the buyer-beware statement covers it
• b.A written estimate of the average decibel level
• c.Disclosure of any noise or accident potential zone✓
• d.A recorded plat showing the flight paths overhead

Section 55.1-704 requires the owner of residential property in a locality where a military air installation is located to "disclose to the purchaser whether the subject parcel is located in a noise zone or accident potential zone, or both, if so designated on the official zoning map," naming the specific zone, on a form the Real Estate Board provides. This is one of the few affirmative disclosures the chapter still demands, so the buyer-beware statement does not absorb it; subdivision A 9 of Section 55.1-702 even keeps this disclosure alive for first sales of a dwelling that are otherwise exempt. No decibel estimate is called for, because the disclosure reports the locality's zoning designation rather than a measurement. And no plat is required. Subdivision B 18 of Section 55.1-703 handles ordinary public-use airport noise the other way, as a no-representation item, and subsection C of Section 55.1-709 removes the termination remedy where the designated zone is below 65 decibels day-night average.

What does Section 55.1-703 say about a septic or other wastewater system serving a Virginia home offered for sale?

• a.The owner must supply a current pump-out receipt
• b.The owner makes no representations about the system✓
• c.The owner must state the tank's size and location
• d.The owner must have the system inspected before sale

Subdivision B 8 of Section 55.1-703 states that "the owner makes no representations with respect to the presence of any wastewater system, including the type or size of the wastewater system or associated maintenance responsibilities," and advises purchasers to exercise whatever due diligence they deem necessary "to determine the presence of any wastewater system on the property and the costs associated with maintaining, repairing, or inspecting any wastewater system, including any costs or requirements related to the pump-out of septic tanks." A pump-out receipt, a description of the tank and a pre-sale inspection would each be an affirmative representation about the system, and this item deliberately makes none. That does not leave a licensee free to help conceal what the licensee actually knows: subsection B of Section 54.1-2131 still requires written disclosure to prospective buyers of material adverse facts about the physical condition that the licensee actually knows.

How does the Virginia Residential Property Disclosure Act treat information about registered sexual offenders near a listed home?

• a.The owner makes no representations about it✓
• b.The owner must attach a printout of the registry search
• c.The listing broker must run the search for every buyer
• d.The owner must disclose any offender within one mile

Subdivision B 6 of Section 55.1-703 provides that "the owner makes no representations with respect to information on any sexual offenders registered under Chapter 23 of Title 19.2, and purchasers are advised to exercise whatever due diligence they deem necessary with respect to such information." The registry is public, so the statute points the buyer at it rather than making the owner a reporter of it. Attaching a printout would be an affirmative representation the item withholds, and it would go stale the day it was printed. Nothing in the chapter shifts the search onto the listing broker, whose duty under Section 55.1-712 is to inform the parties of their own rights and obligations under the chapter. And no distance rule exists in Virginia law; a one-mile radius is invented. Section 55.1-712 adds that a licensee who performs that duty to inform has no further duty to the parties under the chapter.

A Virginia seller does not mention that a homicide occurred in the house years ago. What does Section 55.1-713 provide?

• a.No cause of action arises against owner or licensee✓
• b.The buyer may recover actual damages from the owner
• c.The licensee, but not the owner, must disclose it
• d.The buyer may rescind within three days of learning it

Subsection A of Section 55.1-713 says that "notwithstanding any other provision of this chapter or any other statute or regulation, no cause of action shall arise against an owner or a real estate licensee for failure to disclose that the real property was the site of" either an act or occurrence with no effect on the physical structure or environment, or "a homicide, felony, or suicide." Rescission and actual damages are the remedies subsection B provides for failures to make the disclosures the chapter does require, and this is expressly not one of them. Splitting the duty so that the licensee must speak while the owner need not misreads the subsection, which names owner and licensee together. Subsection C sets the limitation period for actions that do lie under the chapter at one year from receipt of the disclosures, or from settlement where none were delivered.

A Virginia buyer contracts for a condominium unit and no resale certificate has ever been delivered. What is the buyer's cancellation right?

• a.Three days from ratification of the contract
• b.Cancellation at any time prior to settlement✓
• c.Fourteen days from ratification of the contract
• d.No right, because the contract was already ratified

Subsection C of Section 55.1-2312 provides that "if the resale certificate or notice that the resale certificate is unavailable has not been delivered to the purchaser, the purchaser or purchaser's agent may cancel the contract at any time prior to settlement." The three-day period in subsections A and B is the default once a certificate or an unavailability notice has actually been delivered, and no time period was agreed in the contract, so it presupposes the delivery that has not happened here. Fourteen days is the association's deadline to deliver the certificate after a written request under subsection B of Section 55.1-2309, after which the certificate is deemed unavailable. And ratification does not extinguish the right; Section 55.1-2308 requires the contract itself to disclose that the right to receive the certificate and to cancel is waived only if not exercised before settlement. Since the 2023 Acts of Assembly chapters 387 and 388, this one Resale Disclosure Act instrument replaced both the old property owners' association disclosure packet and the old condominium resale certificate.

What must appear in every advertisement placed by an affiliated licensee of a Virginia firm?

• a.The licensee's own individual license number
• b.A statement that the firm is an equal housing lender
• c.The supervising broker's home address and telephone
• d.The firm's name and office contact information✓

Subdivision B 1 of 18VAC135-20-190 requires "a clear, legible, and conspicuous advertising disclosure, which must include (i) the firm's name and (ii) the office contact information," and subsection A requires the firm's licensed name to be clearly and legibly displayed on all advertising under the direct supervision of the principal or supervising broker. Individual license numbers are not part of the required disclosure, though the principal broker may specify additional information in the firm's written policies under the same subdivision. A broker's home address is not required and is not what "office contact information" means. And an equal housing lender line belongs to lending advertisements rather than brokerage ones. Subdivisions B 3 and B 4 add that property information must be consistent with the property's condition and current contract status and be updated in a timely manner when the listing materially changes.