Applied Measurement Professionals, Inc. (AMP) currently provides real estate license exams for Alabama, Georgia, Illinois, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming and Washington.
AMP has been creative in developing test content outlines and test designs to be more relevant to actual real estate practice. For the entry level exam (salesperson or entry level broker), its major innovation was to develop a new way of presenting its test content outine. Instead of just listing a bunch of topics (Agency Relationships, Appraisal, etc.) and subtopics, it created licensee functions lists. The functions lists begin with property listings, then move on to property listing details, providing services to the seller, selling property, buying details, providing services to a buyer, and so on.
In theory, this was just what people wanted, but in practice it made it very difficult for schools and students to pin down exactly what would be covered on the license exam. The outline was terrific for a school developing a Real Estate Practices course, but not so ideal for a prelicense course. So, it is with great relief that I welcome AMP's change in test content outline for 2011. The new outline is back in the familiar topic format, but in much greater detail.
Now we have an exam content ouline from AMP for the National portion of the exam that is an excellent tool for studying for the exam.
If you are in a state that is using the AMP exam, go to
http://www.goamp.com/candidate/CandidateInformation.aspx to get to your content outline.
Once you get there, read down the outline, and determine what you need to understand about each item. For example, the outline starts out by showing that over 1/4 of the exam is on agency relationships and contracts:
1. Agency Relationships and Contracts 28 %
A. Agency Relationships
1. Creating Agency
2. Types of Agency (including implied agency)
3. Rights, Duties and Obligations of the Parties
4. Termination and Remedies for Non-Performance
5. Disclosure (related to representation)
In studying these topics for the exam, think about what you need to know about each one and prepare to answer questions such as:
- How can agency be created?
- What types of agency are there (single, dual, implied, designated, etc.) and what do those terms mean?
- Who are the parties and how do they have to treat others and in turn be treated?
- How do you or the client get out of the relationship?
- What happens if the agent or client fails to perform? (Damages, liqudated damages, etc.)
In some cases, you will have to go back into the course material to find the answers. When you can't easily find the information, or you don't understand something we present, google it.
Your goal is to be able to come back to the outline when you're done and present answers to your questions out loud as if you were explaining the information to a client.
When you can do that, you are ready to pass the exam.
Unfortunately, the outlines for the state portion are not as detailed. But they, too, will make you aware of topics you need to understand to pass the exam. Make sure to find the info in our course and google to find more if you feel the need to. Keep in mind that all we know about the exact test contents is what you see printed on AMP's test content pages.
Next blog will discuss the managing broker exam.