One NC Real Estate Form Was Eliminated. Here Is Why It Matters.

Renee Hackett, REALTOR®

R&B Legacy Group | 632 W 4th Street, Winston-Salem, NC 27101

(336) 302-5803 · ReneeHackett@rblegacygroup.com · realtorreneehackett.com

What Changed, and Why It Matters

Most form updates are revisions. A paragraph gets clearer, a deadline shifts, a box gets added. This one is different. NC REALTORS® deleted a form outright.

Form 220G, the Guidelines for Completing the Cooperative Compensation Agreement, was eliminated effective July 1, 2026. You can read the official line yourself in item 20 of the NC REALTORS® Summary of 2026 Changes to Residential Forms, released May 27, 2026.

The deletion itself is not the story. The reason behind it is. Form 220, the Cooperative Compensation Agreement, was redrafted so completely that its instruction sheet no longer described anything real. So the instruction sheet retired with it.

If you are selling a home in Kernersville or Winston-Salem this year, this shows up in your listing appointment and on your closing statement. I covered the full set of July 2026 updates in my overview of the NC real estate form changes. This post goes deeper on the one piece that generated the most questions.

None of this is legal advice. It is a working summary from an agent who reads these forms every week. For anything specific to your contract, your closing attorney is the right call.

What Form 220G Actually Was

Form 220G was never a contract. Nobody signed it. It was a guidance document, the kind of plain-language companion NC REALTORS® publishes alongside its more complicated forms. Form 2G does the same job for the Offer to Purchase and Contract. Form 101G does it for the Exclusive Right to Sell Listing Agreement.

220G existed to explain how to fill out Form 220 correctly, back when Form 220 was a standalone agreement that a seller, a buyer, and both agents signed to spell out cooperative compensation.

That version of Form 220 is what the North Carolina Real Estate Commission described in its own guidance during the post-settlement period, noting that a seller could sign Form 220 up front and have it ready for prospective buyers. You can read that original NCREC explanation in Has the World Exploded? The NAR Settlement, Commission Law and Rules.

Why the Guidelines Form Went Away

Form 220 was redrafted into something structurally different. Per the NC REALTORS® summary, the redrafted Form 220 is now an addendum to a purchase contract rather than a standalone agreement, and it reflects that buyer agent compensation is paid by the seller. The option for the listing firm to pay it was removed.

Once a form changes from a standalone agreement into a contract addendum, and once one of its two payment paths disappears, a guidance document written for the old version stops being guidance. It becomes a source of confusion. Eliminating it was housekeeping, and it was the right kind.

The Law That Made This Possible

This did not come out of nowhere. North Carolina was, for a long stretch, the outlier.

Commission Rule 21 NCAC 58A .0112(b)(1) barred a broker from using a preprinted offer or sales contract form containing any provision about paying a commission to a broker or firm. NCREC laid that out plainly in its Buyer Agency Agreements bulletin. That rule is exactly why Form 220 had to live outside the contract in the first place.

The North Carolina Legislature changed course with the Regulatory Reform Act of 2025, which allows buyer agent compensation to a broker or firm to be included in a preprinted offer to purchase or sales contract, and directed the Commission to revise Rule 58A .0112 accordingly. NCREC summarized this in its 2025 Year in Review.

New law, new form structure, retired instruction sheet. In that order.

What This Means If You Are Selling

Here is the practical sequence under the new forms.

At the listing appointment, you decide intent, not paperwork. You tell your listing agent what you are willing to offer a buyer's agent, if anything. That goes into your listing agreement. It does not go on Form 220.

You should not be signing Form 220 in advance. NC REALTORS® states this directly. Since Form 220 is no longer a standalone agreement, agents should not have sellers sign it at a listing appointment ahead of time. If someone hands you one at your kitchen table this fall, that is worth a question.

Form 220 appears when there is a real offer. Once a purchase contract is being negotiated and compensation is agreed to, Form 220 is attached as an addendum at that point. It gets written into the section of the contract asking for other addenda drafted by an attorney or a party.

Your listing agreement changed too. The revised Form 101, Exclusive Right to Sell Listing Agreement, now has one standard option in Paragraph 7(c) for offering buyer agent compensation, with a second box for firms carrying their own written policy. Paragraph 7(b) adds a line covering what the firm's compensation may be if a buyer is unrepresented.

The net effect for sellers is more room, not less. You are deciding offer by offer instead of committing before a single showing.

What This Means If You Are Buying

Two things are worth understanding before you write an offer.

First, under the redrafted Form 220, the seller pays the buyer agent compensation. The listing firm is out of that chain on this form.

Second, and this is the part that catches people at the closing table: any buyer agent compensation agreed to in the Form 220 addendum counts as a concession from the seller to the buyer. It sits in addition to any other concessions negotiated in Paragraph 1(e) of the Offer to Purchase and Contract, Form 2-T. Both items land on the closing statement separately.

If you are working through your first purchase, my first-time buyer resources walk through how these numbers actually stack. There is never a stupid question here. I would rather answer ten than have you sign something you are unsure about.

A Short Checklist Before You List

• Confirm your agent is using the July 2026 version of Form 101, not a saved copy from last year
• Decide what you are willing to offer a buyer's agent, and understand that it is a decision, not an obligation
• Ask how your agent handles an unrepresented buyer under Paragraph 7(b)
• Expect Form 220 to arrive with an offer, not before one
• Ask your closing attorney to walk you through how both concession lines appear on your statement
• If you would like to see where your home sits before any of this comes up, my Triad market report is a reasonable starting point, and the seller guide covers pricing and prep in more detail.

The Bottom Line

A deleted form sounds dramatic. In practice, Form 220G disappearing is a sign the process got simpler rather than harder.

Compensation is now negotiated where every other term of the sale is negotiated: inside the contract, with a real offer in front of you. That is a better place for it than a page signed weeks earlier, before you knew who was buying or what they were offering.

What has not changed is the part that matters most. Knowing which questions to ask, and when. Whether you are relocating to the Triad, buying an investment property, or selling the home you raised a family in, the paperwork should be explained to you, not handed to you.

Let's talk about your next move.

About the Author

Renee Hackett, REALTOR® | R&B Legacy Group | License #290693

Renee Hackett has been serving buyers, sellers, and investors in Kernersville and the Piedmont Triad since 2016. She consistently ranks in the top 20% of her market, holds a 5.0 rating, and has closed 125+ transactions across investor, first-time buyer, relocation, and seasoned buyer specializations. She is a native of Randolph County, NC, and brings deep local knowledge to every transaction.

Primary service area: Kernersville, Winston-Salem, High Point, Greensboro, Asheboro, Jamestown, Thomasville, Lexington, Randleman, and the broader Piedmont Triad.