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Privacy Policy

Introduction

Real Estate Institute respects the privacy of all of our customers and we are committed to industry best-practices regarding safeguarding of your personal information. This privacy policy describes how we collect, use and disclose your information, your ability to opt-out of certain sharing of information and an overview of steps we take to protect information from unauthorized use and disclosure.

Information Collection, Use, and Sharing

Real Estate Institute collects information from you in several ways from different parts of our website. The information gathered when you interact with our website and services falls into two categories: (1) “personal” information, which includes the information you supply when you register to use features or services at our website and/or enroll in course programs or purchase products that we sell; and (2) non-personal information which is collected through technology, such as tracking information collected by us and third parties.

Personal information about you may be required to complete enrollment in our courses, for billing purposes, marketing efforts, contests, sweepstakes, and special offers, and/or for regulatory reporting and audit requirements mandated by various Federal and State regulatory bodies. Personal information collected may be non-public information that includes, but is not limited to:

  • Demographic information such as: your mailing addresses, your email address, your employer information and work history, your license number, your age and, in limited circumstances, your SSN.
  • Financial information such as: credit card numbers with expiration dates and CVV numbers, bank routing and account numbers (for check and ACH transactions).

We may collect your personal information through any of the following methods:

  • Voluntary disclosure: We may obtain information you provide us directly either at this website, when speaking with our Customer Service Representatives, through emails you send, through online chat or via other direct contact from you.
  • Referral partners: We may obtain information from individuals or companies with whom you have discussed certain education-related services and who may contact us in an attempt to serve your needs.
  • Data and list providers: We may obtain information through various regulators and providers of data and contact lists for individuals attached to industries that, in general, have a need for services provided by Real Estate Institute.
  • Information collected using technology: Real Estate Institute uses various Internet technologies to manage the services of our website and track the use of our services. Non-personal information that we collect using these technologies may be combined with other information about you.
  • Device Information. We may collect non-personal information about the computer, mobile device, or other device you use to access our website or services, including (but not limited to) your IP address, geolocation information, unique device identifiers, browser type, browser language, and other transactional information.
  • Cookies and similar technologies: A cookie is a small amount of data that is sent to your browser from a web server and stored on your computer’s hard drive. We may use cookies and/or other similar technologies like web beacons to manage our website and email campaigns. We may track information about your activities at our website at any time and over time in an attempt to better serve your needs by providing you more relevant information.
  • Analytics, Log Files, and Reading History: As is true of most websites, we will gather certain information automatically and store it in log files like most other websites. This information may include Internet protocol (IP) addresses (the region or general location where your computer or device is accessing the Internet), browser type, operating system, and other usage information about the use of our website, including a history of the pages you view. We may combine this automatically collected log information with other information we collect about you. This is done so that we may improve the services we offer you. We have also hired third parties to provide us information, reports, and analysis about the usage, browsing patterns of our users. They may independently record the type of device and operating system you are using as well as general location information.
  • Third Party Use of Information (including, but not limited to Google Analytics Tracking, AdWords Remarketing, Facebook Remarketing): Some of the services and advertisements included on our website and in our services are delivered or served by third-party companies, which may collect information about your use of our services. These companies may place or recognize cookies, Web beacons, or other technology to track certain non-personal information from our website users. For example, in the course of serving certain advertisements, an advertiser may place or recognize a unique cookie on your browser in order to collect certain information about your use of our services. For another example, an advertiser or ad server may also be able to collect your device’s unique identifier in the course of serving an ad. In many cases, this information could be used to show you ads on other websites based on your interests. We may not control or have access to these third parties’ use of cookies or other tracking technologies or how they may be used. We use Google Analytics to understand the way that visitors to our website interact with it. We have enabled the following Google Analytics advertising features:
    • Remarketing with Google Analytics
    • Google Display Network Impression Reporting
    • Google Analytics Demographics and Interest Reporting
    • Integrated services that require Google Analytics to collect data for advertising purposes, including the collection of data via advertising cookies and identifiers.
  • We use Google AdWords re-marketing technology to market our website throughout the Internet. We place a cookie on your browser, and Google reads these cookies and may serve an ad on third-party website, after you have visited our website. If you do not want information collected through the use of cookies, there is a simple procedure in most browsers that allows a customer to deny or accept the cookie feature; however, as aforementioned, you should note that the cookies may be necessary for a user to access and use certain features available on our website. You may opt out of Google Analytics tracking by installing the Google Analytics Opt-Out Browser Add-On. You may opt out of ad serving on Google’s opt-out page. We also utilize Facebook Advertising re-marketing technology to market our website throughout the Internet. Facebook may use cookies, web beacons, and similar technologies to collect or receive information from our website and other websites using that information to provide measurement services and ad targeting. You can opt out of the collection and use of information for ad targeting by following Facebook's published opt-out instructions. Additionally, you can opt out of additional web-tracking technologies via the Digital Advertising Alliance’s consumer choice page.

We may use your information for a variety of purposes including, but not limited to:

  • Provide the Services You Request. We use the information we gather about you to enable your use of our services and fulfill your requests for certain products and services. For example, to enroll you in courses for which you have paid tuition or received a complimentary enrollment.
  • Statistical Analysis. We perform statistical, demographic, and marketing analysis of the users of our services and their purchases. This provides information that may help us to improve our customer relationships, for example.
  • Responding to your requests for information on our programs or assistance from our instructors.
  • Contacting you about products or services that we believe may be of interest to you, or sharing information and special offers from other companies, both affiliated and non-affiliated.
  • Email Notices, Ads & Newsletters. We will periodically send you email newsletters or promotional email about our programs and services.
  • Verifying and validating your identity such as when you attempt to login to a classroom equivalent (webinar, online self-study, or online distance education) course that requires authentication.
  • Maintaining a record of our interactions with you if you contact our Customer Service Department, send an email to us or access any web-based help tool we may offer.
  • Investigating and attempting to prevent fraudulent or criminal activity and/or unauthorized use or access of personal information, our website or any other data system.
  • Responding to requests from event sponsors that provide complementary goods or services in conjunction with courses or events that that you attend.
  • In connection with a sale or transfer of some or all of our interests or assets in Real Estate Institute or any affiliated organization.
  • To respond to a subpoena, request from a regulatory agency or as otherwise required by law.

Disclosure of personal information:

In general, we do not sell or rent your personal information to third-parties outside of our organization. However, from time-to-time we may enter into certain affiliate agreements with other companies that are designed to serve our customers’ needs by expanding our business offerings, or provide products and services to others to assist them in servicing their customers. We may share your personal information with these affiliates in the ordinary course of doing business for their use in a manner similar to the ways in which we use your information as described above. Additionally, we may share your information with any partner companies who may have or acquire an ownership stake in Real Estate Institute, in connection with a sale or transfer of all or a portion of our interests in Real Estate Institute and with certain State and Federal regulatory agencies that need your information to verify completion of a regulatory requirement prior to the issuance or renewal of a professional license. Finally, for all orders transacted with a credit card, we must transmit your credit card information to the third-party payment processor and, should you enroll in a course that requires shipping of course materials, we must share your information with the third-party shipper who will be delivering those materials.

Opting Out

We may send you marketing communications, product updates, information on contests or specials and other information that we believe will be of interest to you unless you specifically tell us that you do not wish to receive these types of communications. You may opt out of future contact from us at any time by sending us an email via the contact us form on our website or sending a written request to: Real Estate Institute, 6203 W. Howard St., Niles, IL 60714. Please be specific in your opt-out request by including a statement specifically requesting to "opt out" of direct mail communication, email communication, facsimile communication, SMS text-message communication or all forms of communication. Note that this opt-out will stop marketing communications from us, however you will also need to opt-out of such communications with any of our affiliate organizations with whom you may have shared information that led you to a business relationship with us, or to whom we referred you for services we do not provide.

Additional opt-out information, including instructions to opt-out of Google Analytics and related services, is provided in the Information Collection, Use, and Sharing section of our privacy policy.

Changes To This Policy

We may contact you in the future to provide you any update to this privacy policy as necessary or required by law, regardless of your opt-out status. In addition, we will always notify you of changes to this policy by posting the most recently modified version on our website and we encourage you to visit our website from time-to-time to view the latest version of this policy.