Question 1

When do you hand a visitor the agency disclosure?

Accepted Answer

Ohio is unusually specific here, and the specificity works in your favor at the door. Revised Code 4735.56 requires a licensee working directly with a purchaser, expressly including a seller's agent, to provide the brokerage policy on agency and ask the purchaser to sign for it. The trigger list that sets the deadline excludes showing the property at an open house, so walking a visitor through the house does not by itself start the clock. Prequalifying them, asking for their financial details, discussing an offer, or showing them any property other than that open house all do, so keep copies of your brokerage policy at the sign-in table and hand one over the moment the conversation turns. A separate agency disclosure statement under Revised Code 4735.58 comes later: a purchaser's agent or a seller's subagent working with a purchaser presents it no later than the preparation of an offer to purchase.

Question 2

Can you call or text a visitor afterwards?

Accepted Answer

Ohio's own telemarketing statute steps out of the way for you. Revised Code 4719.01 lists a licensed real estate salesperson or broker soliciting within the scope of the license among the telephone solicitors exempt from sections 4719.02 to 4719.18, so those sections are not what governs your follow-up call to an open house visitor. Two limits matter. The exemption reaches only solicitation within the scope of your license, and it is written as an exemption from those Ohio sections alone, so it says nothing about the separate federal do not call and TCPA rules. Practically, that puts the weight on the sign-in itself: say on the form that you will follow up, keep the record of who typed their own number in, and stop calling when someone asks you to.

Question 3

Does a visitor have to sign a buyer agreement first?

Accepted Answer

Not to walk through the house. Ohio wrote the requirement into statute rather than leaving it to trade practice, and the trigger it chose on the buyer side is making an offer, not touring. Revised Code 4735.55 requires a written agency agreement before advertising or showing residential real property on behalf of a seller, and before making an offer to purchase residential real property on behalf of a purchaser. A visitor who tours your open house and leaves has not crossed that line; writing their offer does. The same section sets what the agreement has to contain, including an expiration date, the terms by which the broker is compensated, and a conspicuous statement that broker fees and commissions are not set by law, are fully negotiable, and may be paid by the seller, the buyer, the landlord, the tenant, or a third party.

Question 4

What do you owe a visitor whose details you keep?

Accepted Answer

The Ohio statute that most directly reaches the leads sitting on your phone is the breach notification section, Revised Code 1349.19. It is keyed to a narrow definition of personal information: a person's name combined with a Social Security number, a driver's license or state ID number, or a financial account or card number together with the code that opens it. An ordinary sign-in of name, phone and email falls outside that definition, which is the best practical argument for never asking a stranger at the door for anything more. Collect one of those elements and the list becomes personal information under that section, which brings its breach notification duties to affected Ohio residents along with it.

Open house rules for Ohio agents

When do you hand a visitor the agency disclosure?

Can you call or text a visitor afterwards?

Does a visitor have to sign a buyer agreement first?

What do you owe a visitor whose details you keep?

How this page is put together

Open house rules where you also work

Your disclosure text, on the screen, at every open house