If you are preparing for your Alberta Real Estate Exam and wondering the importance of each of the chapters from the 500-Page Manual, then it’s next to impossible for you to realize the type of questions you can expect to see in the RECA Exam from each of those chapters. The content can be overwhelming and may seem wearisome to a major extent. This blog post will therefore discuss the various types of questions to expect in the Alberta Real Estate Exam.
The content and the questions you can expect to see in the actual Real Estate Exam can be sub-divided into 2 categories – Definitions and Scenarios.
Definition Questions
These questions will relate to any kind of term that they can ask you to define. So, they can either give you a term to define and they will ask you for the definition of that term or they can give you a definition and they will ask you what term that describes. For example, things like real property, real estate, land, GDP, etc.
These are all the terms that we need to understand as real estate agents, and they can ask you to describe these terms on the exam or they can ask you what this sentence describes. Definition Questions are very common and basic types of questions to expect in the Alberta real estate exam. They will give you an explanation of that term and they will ask you to pick the correct term.
Example 1
The statement, “Anything a brokerage offers or gives to a person who is, or could be, a party to a real estate or mortgage transaction, meant to assist, persuade or cause that person to enter into a particular real estate or mortgage transaction, describes which of the following?”
So here, they have given us a statement which is a definition of a certain term, and we must tell them what is the correct term? They will give us some options and now we must pick what this definition is and what this relates to.
The options are:
A. Inducement
B. Incentive
C. Referral
D. Enticement
The correct answer is A. So, this statement describes the term inducement.
Example 2
What is the difference between an inducement and an incentive?
So here we have two terms, and we have to pick out what are the correct definitions of these terms. So again, this type of question will fall into your definition question.
The statements are:
A. The purpose of inducements is to bring business into the brokerage whereas incentives are used to motivate clients to move forward with the deal.
B. The purpose of incentives is to bring business into the brokerage whereas inducements are used to motivate clients to move forward with the deal.
C. Incentives are used by brokerages to generate business for the associates whereas inducements are used by associates to get their clients to sign the deal.
D. Inducements are used by brokerages to generate business for the associates whereas incentives are used by the associates to get their clients to sign the deal.
The correct answer is B. So, the difference between an inducement and incentive which are both the terms that we now need to define is the purpose of incentives is to bring business into the brokerage whereas inducements are used to motivate clients to move forward with the deal. This is another example of definition-based question.
Example 3
Conduct Deserving of sanction can be best described by:
Again, they’ve given us a term and now we have to find the correct definition of this term.
The options are:
A. conduct that harms the integrity of the profession
B. conduct that breaches the act, rules, regulations
C. conduct that falls below industry standards
D. All of the above.
The correct answer here is D as all these statements describe the term conduct deserving of sanction, so they are all correct.
So, these were some of the examples of definition questions where either they will define a term and they will ask us to tell us what term that is or they will actually give us a term and they will ask us to pick the correct definition, or they can do compare and contrast where you have two terms, and you have to find the correct definition of those terms.
So, all these different types will be covered under definition questions.
Scenario Questions
One of the most difficult types of questions to expect in the Alberta Real estate exam would be scenario or situational questions.
Scenario questions basically ask you who, what, when, where or why of any situation. So, they will give you a scenario and based on that, you will have to answer the given question.
These types of questions are best answered by understanding the concepts. So here, we are not trying to memorize a term, but we must go deeper and really understand the concept so that we can answer these types of questions.
Let us look at some of the examples of these types of questions.
Example 1
Amy and John buy a house together and are registered as tenants in common on the property. John passes away suddenly in a car accident. What happens to the house they purchased together?
In this case, they have given us a scenario and within that scenario, they have some key terms. The key term here as tenants in common. So, they purchase a house together and, on that property, they are registered as tenants in common.
We need to understand what does tenant in common mean, or what is joint tenancy versus tenants in common, the difference between these things. And once we have a good understanding of that concept, we can then answer this question. Let us look at the different options.
A. Amy now owns 100% of the house
B. John’s share passes to his heirs through his will
C. John’s share goes to his son
D. John’s share returns to the crown.
The correct answer is B. Because they are tenants in common, there is no right of survivorship. That is why in this case, Amy does not own the entire house. If they were joint tenants, then Amy would have the right of survivorship, in which she would get the entire house.
Option B is John’s share will pass on to his heirs through his will. This is the correct answer. Whether they say that it will pass on to his heirs through the will or it says it will pass on to the estate, to John’s estate, both of those options will be correct here.
Option C where they say John’s share goes to his son, now they have not told us in the question whether he has a son or a daughter or what kind of children he has or if he has any children in this case, so this is not the best option here.
And the last one, John’s share returns to the crown, again, this is not the best option, because first, it will pass to his estate and if he does not have any heirs, only then will his share go to the crown.
If he dies without a will and without any heirs, then the property will then revert to the crown, otherwise, the best option will be that it goes to his estate, or it goes to his heirs through the will.
Example 2
Rhonda, a real estate associate with Regency Realty Limited, comes into an inheritance and decides to take a year off to travel the world. As such, she decides not to renew her license with her brokerage. How long does Rhonda have to register again with the brokerage before her license expires?
In this case, the scenario is that Rhonda is a real estate associate, and she comes into some money. The gist of the question here is that she is taking a year off to travel.
So, the rest of the question doesn’t really matter. It could be anybody, anywhere. The gist of the question here is if the real estate associate takes a year off, what do they need to do to come back again then? Let’s see how we can best answer this question. They are asking us when does she have to renew her license? The options are:
A. by September 30th of the following year
B. within 24 months after her license expires
C. within 36 months from the last date of her registration
D. by December 31st after the termination of her resignation.
The correct answer here is C. So even though they are telling us that Rhonda is taking a year off to travel the world, her options could change. This means she could decide to stay longer, we do not know that. So right now, what we must go by is if real estate associates decide to not renew their license, how long do they have?
Rhonda must renew her license within 36 months from the last date of their registration. Otherwise, then she must take the entire exams once again.
When we are looking at scenario questions, we really need to get to the heart of the question and look at what they are asking us. A lot of times they will try to confuse us with a lot of scenarios, different things that are going on in the question, we just need to peel the onion here and look at what the main point of the question is really. So here, the focus of the question is a real estate associate takes time off, what is the time limit that they have before their license will expire?
Example 3
A recent newspaper headline states, “Local real estate board says it’s now a buyers’ market.” What does this mean?
I. Property prices are going up
II. Property prices are going down
III. Properties take longer to sell
IV. Properties sell quickly.
And the different options that we have for the answer are:
A. statements I and IV are correct
B. statements II and III are correct
C. statements I and III are correct
D. statements II and IV are correct.
The correct answer is B. So here we need to understand what a buyers’ market is. Once we understand the concept of the buyers’ market and we understand the different characteristics of the buyers’ market, it will be easier for us to answer this question.
Our correct answer is B, which means statements two and three are correct, so in a buyers’ market, property prices will go down and properties will take longer to sell.
Alberta Real Estate School is here to help you guide in the smallest of doubts and the biggest of questions that you can ask for. Learn How much do you need to memorize for the Alberta Real Estate Exam – Tips by Alberta Real Estate School.
Join our community and dive in the deep world of real estate and see how to become a confident Real Estate Agent! For updates, call us directly at 587.936.7779.