House Bill 18-1174 continued the Board of Mortgage Loan Originators (the “Board”) for eleven years, until September 1, 2029. The bill clarifies when the 60-day deadline commences for the Board to make a licensing determination. The bill aligns the educational requirements for initial licensure with those established by the SAFE Act of 2008. It also aligns the criminal disqualifiers for licensure with the federal requirements. Finally, the bill encourages the Governor to appoint a licensed mortgage loan originator who is an employee of or independent contractor for a Colorado-based mortgage company to one of the three seats for a licensed mortgage loan originator on the Board.

House Bill 18-1175 proposed to continue the regulation of community association managers for five years, until September 1, 2023. It proposed to make modifications to the type of supervision an apprentice would need to have and it removed the automatic acceptance of trade association credentials from the list of acceptable qualifying education offerings. The bill also proposed to modify the process for issuing cease and desist orders and would have enabled the Division Director to hold hearings prior to the issuance of a cease and desist order. Ultimately, House Bill 18-1175 was postponed indefinitely. The regulation of community association managers will not continue and the program is now in the wind up phase until June 30, 2019, when it will cease to no longer exist. In the interim, anyone who performs duties requiring a community association manager’s license will need to obtain or maintain a license until the program ends on June 30, 2019.

House Bill 18-1290 proposed to continue the certification of conservation easement holders for seven years, until September 1, 2025. It also proposed to authorize the Director of the Division of Real Estate to share information about conservation easements with a third-party vendor to develop a registry of conservation easements in the state for which tax credits have been received. This information would have been reported annually to the General Assembly as part of the Department of Regulatory Agencies’ SMART Act presentation. This bill was postponed indefinitely, but the certification program was amended into the second sunset bill, House Bill 18-1291. After several amendments to House Bill 18-1291, it created a Division of Conservation within the Department of Regulatory Agencies. The new division is responsible for the administration of the holder certification program, the tax credit certification program and it will house the Conservation Easement Oversight Commission. The program is scheduled to repeal on July 1, 2019.

House Bill 18-1227 allows the Real Estate Commission to issue original licenses with expiration dates of December 31^st in the year of issue. The bill also enables the Commission to transition real estate brokers to a calendar year expiration date if a broker has allowed his license to expire within the anniversary license cycle. Finally, the bill requires that a real estate broker with a transitional license, i.e. a license cycle that is moving from an anniversary date to a calendar date expiration, to complete only two annual commission update courses during the transitional cycle. Brokers with a transitional license cycle will still need to complete 24-hours of continuing education.

Senate Bill 18-210 amended the regulation of appraisal management companies to ensure consistency between state law and federal regulations. The bill modified the definition of an appraisal management company and created a definition for an appraisal panel. The Board of Real Estate Appraisers (the “Board”) will have to maintain a separate list of appraisal management companies that meet the federal thresholds for licensure so that the Board collects and transmits the requisite National Registry Fees to the Appraisal Subcommittee. The bill also directs the Board to require that an appraisal management company establish processes and controls to ensure compliance with the federal Truth-in-Lending Act, specifically with the appraisal independence requirements.