Why Georgia has a Commission
Georgia decided that real estate licensing should be run by people who know the business, supervised by the state. O.C.G.A. 43-40-2 builds the Georgia Real Estate Commission around that idea: practitioners regulate practitioners, with one seat reserved for the public.
Composition and terms
The Commission has six members, each appointed by the Governor and confirmed by the Senate for a term of five years. Five of the six must be licensees actively engaged in real estate for at least five years; the sixth represents the consumer interest and is a full voting member.
Nobody is elected. Licensees do not vote for Commission members. The Commission is assigned to the Secretary of State for administrative purposes only, so the Secretary of State appoints no one and supervises no rulemaking.
Quorum and meetings
Four members constitute a quorum, and the Commission must meet at least once a month. The chairperson is chosen from among the members by secret ballot at the first regular meeting of the year.
Exam trap: the quorum is four, not five. The number five belongs to the composition rule (five of six must be licensees), and candidates routinely swap the two. Nothing requires all six to attend for disciplinary business; a member with a conflict is recused instead.
The real estate commissioner
O.C.G.A. 43-40-4 creates the office of real estate commissioner within the Commission. The Commission appoints the commissioner and fixes the salary. The commissioner is a full-time employee and the chief executive officer of the Commission and may hold no interest in any real estate business.
Keep the two appointment powers apart:
- The Governor appoints Commission members, with Senate confirmation.
- The Commission appoints the commissioner, who is staff, not a seventh member.
- The Secretary of State appoints nobody and has only a housekeeping role.
There is no seventh voting member, and the secret-ballot election you may half-remember is the choice of chairperson, not of the commissioner.