The Legal Description and RESPA News have teamed up to provide the real estate, mortgage and settlement services industries with a special report that touches on all aspects of building and maintaining legal affiliated business arrangements under RESPA and the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s guidelines.

Some RESPA attorneys have indicated that affiliated business arrangements are not as easy to establish, maintain and operate as they were three years ago because of the increased focus on compliance. This report takes a look at the numerous aspects of affiliated business arrangements and what to consider when evaluating them for compliance.

The report includes:

• A synopsis of how affiliated business arrangements are holding up in the current market and against the recent ramp up in regulatory enforcement;
• An overview on how to maintain a financially viable AfBA in the current marketplace;
• A detailed educational section on how to legally structure a joint venture, including the rules around in-kind contributions, how much capital or employees are needed and how to legally maintain part-time employees;
• A section explaining the rules around subcontracting out employee payroll and benefits, what other services can be contracted out, and how to keep office space for your joint venture separate;
• Answers to questions regarding how much business a parent company can give to its joint venture; HUD’s 10-point sham AfBA test; rules on marketing arrangements; and the rules surrounding marketing arrangements, offering discounts with bundled services and modifying AfBA disclosures.