National Real Estate Exam
Failed the national portion, or want to check it on its own? Start here. The national portion is 80 scored questions on general real estate law and practice, and it is the same test whatever state you sit it in. Of the 49 states whose question counts we have verified against a candidate handbook, 38 run exactly 80. The full 80-question test is drawn to the same content weights as the real thing, and 10 sample questions are answered below.
Take the full test. Answers and explanations are shown when you submit, as on exam day.
A contract says an earnest deposit will be credited toward the purchase price. How should that deposit be treated at closing?
This practice exam is a study aid, not the real exam. Our questions are written by us to match the published content outline. They are not actual exam questions, no score here predicts a pass, and this site is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by PSI, Pearson VUE, ARELLO, any state real estate commission, or any government agency. Your state commission and your candidate handbook are the only authoritative sources.
What the national portion actually is
Almost every US state buys its licensing exam in two pieces. The first is a national portion written by the test provider, covering the law and practice that is broadly common across the country: contracts, agency, financing, valuation, title, disclosures, the federal fair housing rules. The second is a state portion written to your own state's license law. You sit them in one session, on one computer, and you get one score report.
There is no such thing as a national real estate license, and no national passing score. The national portion is the only thing that is national, and what it buys you is leverage: it is the 80 questions you can prepare for without knowing which state you will end up licensed in, and the questions that stay valid if you move before you sit.
Providers add a small number of unscored pretest items on top of the scored ones. They are being trialed for future exams, they are not labeled, and they do not count. That is the honest reason not to spend four minutes on the one question that looks unlike anything you studied.
The practical consequence: in most states you pass or fail the two portions separately, so failing the state portion does not usually mean re-sitting the 80 national questions. Check your own state before you assume it, because the rule is not universal and the retake fee is not either.
The 38 states that run 80 national questions, and the 11 that do not
We read the current candidate handbook for every state, 50 documents in total. On the size of the national portion they agree far more than the internet does: 38 of the 49 we could verify print 80 scored national items. The table below is every state that does something else, with the document the figure came from.
| State | National items | State items | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| California | 150 | One combined paper | handbook, 2026-07-29 |
| Florida | 100 | One combined paper | handbook, 2026-07-29 |
| Georgia | 100 | 52 | handbook, 2026-07-29 |
| Illinois | 100 | 40 | handbook, 2026-07-30 |
| Missouri | 100 | 40 | handbook, 2026-10-22 |
| New Mexico | 75 | 50 | handbook, 2026-07-30 |
| North Dakota | 100 | 40 | handbook, 2026-07-30 |
| South Dakota | 90 | 52 | handbook, 2026-07-30 |
| Vermont | 100 | not published | handbook, 2026-10-22 |
| Washington | 100 | 30 | handbook, 2026-07-30 |
| Wisconsin | 140 | One combined paper | handbook, 2026-07-30 |
Two things in that table are worth more than the numbers. First, 3 of these states do not have a national portion at all: California, Florida, Wisconsineach set one combined paper written to a single state outline, so there is no separate national half to pass, transfer or retake. Anyone telling a California candidate that they face "100 national plus 50 state" is describing an exam the Department of Real Estate does not administer.
Second, a national portion larger than 80 is not a harder exam, it is a differently reported one. Several of the 100-item states are counting the same content outline with a different item budget. The composition, which is what you actually study, moves much less than the headline count.
We could not verify a national question count for New York. Rather than print a figure copied from another site, those rows are absent. If you are sitting in one of those states, the count in your current candidate handbook is the only number worth trusting.
The two portions are usually scored separately
This is the single most useful thing to know about the national portion, and it is the thing most prep sites flatten into one percentage. In most states each portion has its own pass mark and you must clear both. A composite score is not calculated, which means a strong national result cannot rescue a weak state result.
4 of the states in our dataset publish a pass mark that is explicitly different for each portion. These are the notes we recorded against those states when we read their handbooks:
- Colorado. There is no single passing percentage, which is why we draw no pass line. PSI states Colorado’s pass marks as raw correct answers and they differ by portion: 60 of 80 on the national (75%) and 53 of 74 on the state (71.6%). You must clear both. Source, verified 2026-07-30
- Illinois. The two portions have DIFFERENT pass marks: the national portion is 70% and the state portion is 75%. 75 is recorded here as the stricter of the two; a candidate scoring 70% on the national portion has in fact passed it. Source, verified 2026-07-30
- Missouri. Missouri uses TWO different pass marks in the same sitting: 70% on the 100-question national portion and 75% on the 40-question state portion. We show the stricter 75% so the meter cannot tell you that you passed when you did not. Between 70% and 75% you have passed the national portion and failed the state one. Source, verified 2026-10-22
- Virginia. Virginia’s two portions have different pass marks, so there is no single percentage and we draw no pass line. PSI publishes them as raw scores: 56 for the national portion (56 of 80 = 70%) and 30 for the state portion (30 of 40 = 75%). The state portion is the stricter of the two. Source, verified 2026-07-30
That is why the score meter above draws no pass line. There is no national standard for it to draw. Take your percentage here as a diagnostic of which content areas are weak, then read your own state's line off its practice exam page, where the line is drawn from that state's own handbook or deliberately left undrawn when the state publishes a scaled score instead.
One useful side effect of separate scoring: candidates licensed in another state who move are often required to sit the state portion only, because the national portion they already passed is treated as the same test. The reverse never applies. Passing the national portion alone licenses you nowhere.
What the 80 questions are made of
The full test is not a random 80 questions. It is stratified across the eleven content areas the provider publishes, so the shape of the test matches the shape of the real paper. The count column is what each area supplies to the full test.
| Content area | Share of the exam | In the full test | What it covers |
|---|---|---|---|
| Contracts | 19% | 15 | Offer and acceptance, contingencies, breach, addenda, discharge |
| Agency | 13% | 10 | Fiduciary duties, agency relationships, disclosure, termination |
| Practice of real estate | 12% | 10 | Trust and escrow accounts, advertising, antitrust, fair housing enforcement, licensee supervision |
| Property ownership | 10% | 8 | Estates, tenancies, encumbrances, legal descriptions, land measurement |
| Financing | 10% | 8 | Loan types, clauses, RESPA, points, lending rules, settlement |
| Valuation | 8% | 6 | Appraisal approaches, market value, depreciation, CMA |
| Property disclosures | 7% | 6 | Material defects, lead paint, environmental hazards, stigmatised property |
| Real estate math (calculations) | 7% | 6 | Property area, valuation, commission, loan costs, settlement costs, investment, management calculations |
| Transfer of title | 6% | 5 | Deeds, title insurance, recording, constructive notice |
| Land use controls | 5% | 4 | Zoning, variances, eminent domain, private restrictions |
| Property management | 3% | 2 | Leases, landlord-tenant duties, management agreements, habitability |
Read that table as a study plan and not as trivia. Contracts and agency together are 32% of the paper, which is more than a third of everything you will be asked, while the areas most candidates fear are smaller than they expect. Real estate math is 7%, roughly 6 questions of 80. Worth being able to do cold, not worth a week.
Weightings come directly from the test provider’s published examination content outline for the national portion of the salesperson exam. PSI publishes percentages only; Pearson VUE publishes scored-item counts only. PSI and Pearson VUE use different content taxonomies, so their weightings are not interchangeable and should not be averaged. Check which provider administers your state’s exam, and confirm against the current candidate handbook before you study. Outlines are revised periodically and older versions stay in circulation online. View the PSI outline. We cross-checked it against 3 independent state bulletins carrying the same outline, so a single stale handbook cannot skew the weights.
10 sample national questions, answered
Every question above with its correct answer and the reasoning behind it. Read the explanations for the ones you answered correctly too. A lucky guess and knowing the rule look identical on a score report. These are sample questions from our larger bank.
1. A contract says an earnest deposit will be credited toward the purchase price. How should that deposit be treated at closing?
Why: A price credit recognizes funds already deposited. Counting the deposit as an extra charge would make the buyer pay it twice.
2. The doctrine of equitable conversion generally holds that once a valid purchase contract is signed:
Why: Equitable conversion means the buyer acquires equitable title while the seller holds legal title in trust pending closing. Reversing the roles so the seller becomes the equitable owner misstates the doctrine, which exists to protect the buyer's contract interest.
3. A transaction broker, sometimes called a facilitator, is best described as someone who:
Why: Transaction brokerage is a non-agency relationship: the licensee moves the deal along without owing fiduciary duties or advocating for a side. Calling it representation of both parties describes dual agency, which is a different animal.
4. A broker deposits an earnest-money check into the brokerage operating account, then two weeks later uses part of it to cover payroll. The second act constitutes:
Why: Depositing client funds into the operating account is commingling. Spending them escalates the offense to conversion, which is theft and typically costs the license.
5. An owner dies leaving a valid will that devises her house to a cousin. The house will:
Why: Escheat applies only when there is no will AND no heirs. A valid devise defeats it entirely — a common exam trap that swaps testate for intestate.
6. Under traditional conventional qualifying guidelines written as 28/36, the second number refers to:
Why: The 36 is the back-end or total debt ratio, covering housing plus car loans, student loans, and minimum card payments. The 28 is the front-end ratio, which counts housing expense alone.
7. A property produces net operating income of $96,000 and comparable sales indicate a capitalization rate of 8 percent. What value does direct capitalization indicate?
Why: Income divided by rate gives value: $96,000 divided by 0.08 equals $1,200,000. Multiplying $96,000 by 8 produces $768,000, which is the common error of reversing the capitalization formula.
8. An owner whose transaction otherwise qualifies for a Fair Housing Act exemption may still be liable if the owner:
Why: The ban on discriminatory advertising, notices, and statements applies to everyone, so no exemption protects an owner who advertises a preference or limitation based on a protected class.
9. A home listed at $450,000 sells for 4% below list. The listing agent’s brokerage keeps half of a 5.5% commission. What does the listing brokerage receive?
Why: Sale price is $450,000 × 0.96 = $432,000. Commission is $432,000 × 0.055 = $23,760; half is $11,880. Using the list price instead of the sale price gives $12,375.
10. A grantor conveys a farm but keeps a life estate in the residence and all mineral rights. The clause accomplishing this is the:
Why: A reservation in favor of the grantor is made through the "Reddendum clause". The habendum clause is tempting because it also concerns the estate conveyed, but it defines what the grantee receives rather than what the grantor keeps.
Where to go next
This page is untimed and tells you the answer as you go. When you want to know whether you can hold that up for a full paper under a clock, sit the simulator instead. When you want the half of the exam this page deliberately leaves out, go to your own state.