Looks like its last closing will be its own. We’ve just learned that National Real Estate Information Services, Inc. (NREIS), a Pennsylvania company that once provided “real estate settlement services” (i.e. real estate closings with little or no attorney involvement) is closing its doors. NREIS is the defendant in a long-running lawsuit brought by the Real Estate Bar Association of Massachusetts (REBA), which asserts that NREIS is engaged in the unauthorized practice of law (UPL). That case, which remains pending in federal court in Boston (at least for the time being), spawned an important 2011 decision (pdf) by the Supreme Judicial Court (SJC), which clarified what it means to “practice law” in the context of a real estate transaction, and appeared to spell doom for NREIS’s business model in Massachusetts. See our prior post on NREIS, REBA’s lawsuit, and the SJC’s decision – in which we foreshadowed NREIS’s demise – here.
