Late last year, with great fanfare, the U.S. Department of Justice announced the settlement of a lawsuit it had brought against the National Association of Realtors (NAR). In this lawsuit, the DOJ accused the NAR of engaging in various practices the DOJ considered anti-competitive and in violation of the Sherman Act, the federal law that prohibits monopolies and other anti-trust activities. In an unusual move, the DOJ announced the settlement of the lawsuit at the same time it announced the filing of the lawsuit — on Nov. 19. As the DOJ noted in its complaint, the NAR is a nationwide trade association that substantially controls how residential real estate is bought and sold. It exercises this control by requiring 1,400+ local real estate broker associations that belong to it, and the individual brokers who belong to those associations, to play by its rules. Not playing by those rules risks expulsion, in which event the benefits the NAR provides to its members (for example, a malpractice insurance program) could be lost.