President Barack Obama signed a bill into law Wednesday that permanently prohibits banks from entering the real estate brokerage and management business.
The bill–H.R. 1105, the Omnibus Appropriations Bill–ends the National Association of REALTORS’ nearly eight-year battle to preserve the separation between banking and commerce.
“If banks had been allowed to engage in real estate brokerage, it would have created anti-competitive and anti-consumer concentrations of power within the financial services sector, which would have ultimately increased costs for homebuyers,” according to an NAR resource page it has devoted to the issue.
