HOUSTON — The National Association of Realtors opened up its books on Monday, providing a public peek at the financial health of the world’s largest trade organization after a period of internal transformation and with major expenses looming.
The good news? NAR hasn’t lost members like it anticipated, it reined in expenses through cost-cutting measures, and it is preparing to shift money around to cover upcoming payments while keeping dues flat for 2026.
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The organization indicated it will remain in a cost-cutting stance next year and expects to slash expenses by $41 million below this year’s expenses.
“This underscores the progress made in reinforcing NAR’s fiscal health, and the challenges still ahead,” NAR Treasurer Craig Sanford said. “The organization will continue to be committed to resolving outstanding obligations while maintaining operational stability.”
At the end of last year, NAR had $319.6 million in the bank. That fell by more than half when the organization made a $197 million settlement payment in February, and more payments are coming soon.
“As of Sept. 30, we have $267.2 million in marketable securities and a cash balance of $62.6 million, which will help cover operating expenses for the last three months of this year,” Sanford said.
Marketable securities are highly liquid assets that can easily be converted into cash. Depending on expenses through the end of this year and member dues payments in January, NAR may have to liquidate some of those assets soon.
The organization is required to make the next settlement payment of $72 million this coming February.
Dues will remain unchanged next year, at $156, although the organization is planning to use most of an assessment that was levied on members for a national advertising campaign to pay for operating expenses.
Out of a $45 ad campaign assessment, $35, or 78 percent, will be used to pay for operating expenses. The assessment was created in 1999, when it was $10, and has slowly increased since then. It was last raised in 2022.
The NAR Board of Directors approved that change and held member dues steady during a mid-year meeting in June. It noted that $55 of the members’ $156 in dues, or 35 percent, will be used for lobbying next year.
The organization has been able to avoid dues increases and further cost-cutting in part because it has retained more members than expected. For 2025, NAR expected to lose roughly 100,000 members. It budgeted for 1.4 million dues-paying members this year, but it has 1.49 million.
Nykia Wright on screen at NAR NXT in Houston, Nov. 17, 2025. Photo by Taylor Anderson
“[Membership has] been relatively sticky, but we are in a race to continue to prove our worth,” NAR CEO Nykia Wright said in a meeting with reporters.
Next year will test how sticky that number remains.
NAR announced that it would enact a new strategic plan to guide the organization’s work in 2026-2028, with much of it focused on providing better service to members in part by modernizing the tools it provides and by customizing the way those tools are provided.
That work is largely aimed at showing the value to real estate agents, more of whom could soon gain the ability to access their local MLSs without being required to join a Realtor organization.
NAR’s 2026 budget is based on falling to 1.2 million members next year, a number that could be dependent on both NAR’s ability to prove its value and on macroeconomic factors like interest rates and inventory.
“Right now we are well above that, but we are cognizant of all of the market conditions and people’s choice,” Wright said.
Beating its membership expectations left NAR with an additional $18.3 million in revenue compared to its forecast, Sanford said.
NAR has also been better at reining in its expenses than it expected. Expenses through September were $8.6 million lower than forecast.
