As of June 15th, 2021 the Coronavirus Property Entry and Advisory Declaration (PEAD) will be retired, and Realtors throughout our Golden State are rejoicing! The PEADs were a time suck, especially in the versions used until recently where a buyer and their agent had to sign a PEAD for each property they showed. In May the California Association of Realtors finally came out with a version called the PEAD – ALL which was not property specific. Currently buyers and their agents only needed to sign the PEAD – ALL once. It would have been nice if they had come out with this version 12 months ago, but we are of course in a much better place now.
I don’t work with a lot of buyers so the PEAD never really bogged me down. I’d get the sellers to sign their PEAD one time, then when people made appointments to show my listings I’d gather their PEADs in my inbox, often 20-40 for each listing. The PEAD became another document in the ocean of disclosures that accompanies each transaction.
As with other disclosures my approach to the PEAD was always based on common sense. Do you have Covid, Covid symptoms or have you been around anyone with Covid in the past 10 days? If you have then you can’t go into someone else’s house because they don’t want you there. Your Realtor doesn’t want you there for that matter either. Likewise, if you are a client and your Realtor has been exposed to Covid, you don’t want that Realtor showing you property. I was recently in that situation.
A few weeks back I was in close contact with a couple and they were both subsequently diagnosed with Covid. I had been double masked and they had been double masked. I had been vaccinated and to their great regret and misfortune they hadn’t. Because I had been vaccinated even though the CDC guidelines don’t dictate I quarantine after the exposure, I still pretty much did. Once I told them what was going on, people were happy not to see me. I postponed appointments with clients and when my buyers wanted to see two houses that were on the market I had a couple of agents do the showings for me. I tested negative a week after the exposure, and I still sequestered for another couple of days despite having no symptoms. When I finally did start meeting clients again, I wore a mask.
Even though the PEAD will soon be a thing of the past, masks may be here for a while longer. With no restrictions on open houses will you go into a house full of strangers without a mask? Homeowners and their agents can insist that visitors wear masks, so don’t be surprised if you are asked to cover your mouth and nose. Posted rules of entry are also going away.
I posted rules of entry at the front door of every listing I sold over the course of the pandemic, put out wipes, hand sanitizer and a bin for the Covid refuse. You can imagine how sketchy it felt collecting those bins at closing and disposing of the trash. I felt like I was working with hazardous waste, because potentially I was. After a while though it got to be routine, like everything else and we all found ways to show and sell properties over the course of the pandemic.
We are all ready to close the book on the pandemic. I can’t wait until June 15th to toss my PEADs in the nearest Covid bin.