← The History of NAREB: From Tampa, 1947, to Today
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Before There Was a NAREB: Black Brokers Build Their Own Tables
Welcome to The History of NAREB: From Tampa 1947 to Today. This course tells the story of the National Association of Real Estate Brokers, founded in Tampa, Florida, on July 29, 1947, and of the Realtists who have carried its work forward ever since.
Before we get to that night in Tampa, we need to understand the world the founders were answering. This first module covers the decades before 1947, when Black real estate professionals were shut out of the mainstream industry and Black families were shut out of whole neighborhoods.
One abbreviation, two organizations
Here is something that trips up a lot of people who read old documents. In the historical record, "NAREB" can mean two very different organizations.
- The National Association of Real Estate Brokers: the Black organization founded in Tampa in 1947. This is our NAREB, the home of the Realtists.
- The National Association of Real Estate Boards: the white organization that used that name from 1916 until 1972, when it renamed itself the National Association of REALTORS, or NAR.
Key takeaway: when you see "NAREB" in a document from before 1972, check which group is meant. NAR's own history pages call its 1913 code of ethics "NAREB's Code." That is the white Boards group, not the Black Brokers group.
In this course, "NAREB" always means the Brokers, the Realtists. When we talk about the white organization, we call it the National Association of Real Estate Boards, or simply NAR.
Organizing long before 1947
NAREB did not appear out of nowhere. According to NAREB's own history, local Black real estate groups began forming in the 1880s. Most of them joined the National Business League, which was founded by Booker T. Washington.
Two local boards founded in the 1920s, one in Harlem in New York City and one called Dearborn in Chicago, are described as the oldest continuously active Realtist organizations. They are older than NAREB itself.
NAR's own 2018 fair housing feature tells the same story from the other side. Barred from local REALTOR boards, Black brokers in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles and other cities formed boards of their own.
Did you know? The oldest Realtist boards in the country are older than the national organization. When the founders met in Tampa in 1947, they were building on local groundwork that Black brokers had already laid.
The word "Realtor" arrives
In 1916, Charles N. Chadbourn of the Minneapolis Real Estate Board coined the word "Realtor." It became the title of the white boards' members. Decades later, NAR registered "REALTORS" and "REALTOR" as collective marks, on September 13, 1949 and January 10, 1950.
Why does a word matter so much? Because a title is only as open as the group that grants it. Local boards decided who could join, and as you will see in the next lessons, many of them wrote exclusion right into their rules.
Who this course is for
This course is free and self-paced. It is for Realtists, REALTORS, real estate professionals of every kind, and everyday home buyers who want to understand how the housing market they live in came to be.
Each module ends with a short quiz. Every answer can be found in that module's lessons, so read closely, watch the videos and take your time.
What's ahead in Module 1
- How local boards kept Black brokers out, and what the 1924 Code of Ethics said about race
- How racially restrictive covenants spread in the 1920s
- How the federal government's HOLC maps and FHA rules built redlining into lending
- What happened in Detroit in 1942, five years before NAREB's founding