The National Association of Realtors asked the American Association of Realtors for documents related to the NAR Accountability Project, and ARA said “no.”
The rift between the National Association of Realtors and Mauricio Umansky’s thePLS.com has taken a new turn, with NAR issuing subpoenas to the National Association of Realtors and its co-founder Jason Haber.
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The subpoena asks ARA and Harbor to hand over all documents, contracts, invoices, and all communications between ARA, thePLS.com, and theNLS.com, the Spanish version of PLS. NAR also emphasized clear cooperation policies and an interest in communication regarding the NAR Accountability Project, which Mr. Haber launched in 2023 in response to sexual misconduct allegations against former NAR President Kenny Purcell.
Jason Haber | LinkedIn
NAR issued a subpoena in May, giving ARA and Harbor until June 18 to turn over documents dating back to January 1, 2017. However, Haber said in an Instagram post Monday morning that neither Haber nor ARA would respond to NAR’s request, given that it “involves highly confidential conversations with victims who have come forward about harassment within NAR.”
“The NAR Accountability Project was shut down before ARA existed. I’ll leave it to you to decide what that file has to do with the private listing case,” he said. “ARA opposes this in the strongest possible terms. We will not tolerate legal claims about publicly traded networks that violate the privacy of those who have had the courage to come forward.”
NAR and thePLS.com have been in court since 2020, when thePLS.com filed an antitrust lawsuit against NAR after the association adopted an explicit cooperation policy at the time that required real estate agents to submit listings to NAR-affiliated multiple listing services within 24 hours of publicly selling a property.
NAR and thePLS.com previously reached an agreement to dismiss the lawsuit, leaving open the possibility of re-filing it at a later date, as explained in a previous Inman article.
“What we landed on was giving them a paid statute of limitations agreement to give them time to decide whether to comply with repealing a clear cooperation policy,” former NAR outside counsel Ethan Glass said at the 2024 hearing.
Umansky and thePLS.com reopened the case in July 2025, arguing that NAR’s CCP remains anticompetitive even with the addition of delayed marketing exemption listings under the multiple listing option policy for sellers.
“The rapid increase in consumer demand for pocket listings and the rise of listing networks to effectively market pocket listings posed a competitive threat to the viability of the NAR-affiliated MLS system,” the July 2025 complaint states. “These market changes also threatened NAR’s ability to control competition in the residential real estate brokerage industry.”
“The co-conspirators at NAR and MLS, through a clear policy of cooperation, eliminated the possibility of a more competitive future in the residential real estate listing network services market,” it added. “A once-in-a-lifetime competitive opportunity in a monopolistic market was lost. NAR’s actions harm competition and consumers, and are illegal.”
NAR responded to thePLS.com’s lawsuit in September and categorically denied the network’s antitrust claims, saying Umansky and thePLS.com had not been subject to any “antitrust violations.”
“NAR’s policies and NAR’s conduct identified in thePLS.com’s amended complaint are lawful, legitimate, pro-competitive and pro-consumer, conducted within NAR’s legitimate business interests, and constitute legitimate competitive activities, which interests outweigh any alleged anti-competitive effects,” NAR said.
Inman reached out to NAR about Haber’s post and next steps now that the subpoena has expired. We will update the story as comments arrive.
As for Mr. Haber, the ARA founder said he is prepared to fight NAR’s request.
“The commitments I made while running the NAR Accountability Project remain in place,” he said. “We’re going to fight this, and we’re going to protect the people we’re supposed to protect.”
Please read the full subpoena below.
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