Texas Real Estate License Renewal Hub

Your Texas real estate license renewal deadline doesn’t send a calendar invite. One day you’re closing deals. The next, you realize your license expires in three weeks — and you still have 18 hours of CE left to finish. Most agents wait too long. Meanwhile, CE providers make it worse: they take 1 to 3 business days to post completed hours to TREC. That’s exactly how licenses expire. TREA fixes all of it. 100% online CE, any device, any hour, with credit posted to TREC in about 3 seconds. Here’s exactly how to get renewed and stay that way.

Step 1: Check Your Texas Real Estate License Status

Before you enroll in a single CE course, know where you stand. Log into the TREC LARS portal at agents.trec.texas.gov using your email address and password. Go to the Licenses tab. Click “Real Estate Education History” to see every CE credit on your official TREC record — provider, course name, hours, and date.

That screen tells you exactly how many hours you have, how many you still need, and when your license expires. Don’t guess. Never assume your broker has been tracking it. Go look.

Not sure what your license status actually means? Use our TREC license lookup guide →

Once you’re in, the status labels tell the story fast. Here’s what each one means:

What the License Status Labels Mean

• Active: You’re good. Keep your CE current before your expiration date.
• Inactive: License has expired or gone inactive. You cannot practice real estate until renewed.
• Expired: Since October 2023, expired licenses terminate your brokerage affiliation automatically. This is not a small problem.

Step 2: Know Your CE Requirements — All 18 Hours

Every Texas real estate agent renewing an active license must complete 18 hours of Texas real estate CE during each 2-year renewal cycle. Your renewal cycle runs from your license issue date — not some universal Texas-wide deadline. That means your expiration date is yours alone. Check it in TREC LARS.

Here’s the mandatory breakdown:

Important: Legal Update I and Legal Update II are mandatory. TREC requires both by name, every renewal cycle — no substitutions allowed. No Legal Updates means no renewal. Notably, TREA is one of only five providers in Texas offering both Legal Update I and II in classroom AND online formats.

Step 3: Complete Your CE Online — Tonight If You Want

This is where most agents either waste time or get it done. The process at TREA is straightforward:

1. Browse and enroll. Pick your courses at academytexas.com. The Hall Pass bundle covers all 18 required hours from $75. For extra electives and more value, Dean’s List starts at $85.
2. Watch the course video. 100% online, self-paced. No app to download. Works on your laptop, tablet, or phone — whatever you have in front of you at 11 PM.
3. Pass the quiz. Short knowledge checks at the end of each course. Straightforward.
4. Credits post to TREC in ~3 seconds. Not 1 business day. Not 3 business days. Three seconds. TREA posts directly to TREC the moment you pass — 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. You can log into agents.trec.texas.gov right after finishing and see the credit.

That last point is TREA’s key differentiator. Most CE providers batch-upload completions to TREC once or twice per business day — sometimes less. Finish a course at 6 PM on a Friday and your credit might not appear until Monday morning. With TREA, it’s there before you close your laptop.

TREA holds TREC-approved CE Provider #10010-CEP status. Every course counts. No guessing whether credits will be recognized.

Not Ready to Commit? Start Free.

TREA offers a free 2-hour CE course — the Personality Profile class — with no payment required. You earn 2 real CE hours toward your renewal, posted instantly to TREC. Start earning hours for free →

Step 4: Submit Your Renewal Application to TREC

With your CE hours posted, the finish line is one more step away.

Head back to agents.trec.texas.gov and submit your renewal application. Pay the TREC renewal fee ($110 for active renewal). TREC processes it and updates your license.

TREA posts credits in ~3 seconds. That means you can finish CE and submit your renewal in the same sitting — no waiting between steps. Agents who use slow providers sometimes submit their renewal before CE even appears in TREC’s system. That triggers delays, support tickets, and stress. Skip all of it.

Renewal timeline with TREA: Finish CE → credits appear in TREC in seconds → submit renewal application → done. All in one evening if needed.

Why Agents Let Their License Expire (And How Not To)

It’s almost never intentional. Here’s how it usually goes wrong:

• Waiting until the last week. Life gets busy. The renewal deadline gets pushed back mentally until it’s suddenly a crisis. Simple fix: set a reminder 90 days before your expiration date. Do a few hours of CE per month instead of a marathon at the end.
• Using a slow CE provider. If your provider takes 3 business days to post credits and your license expires tomorrow, you have a real problem. Agents have let their licenses lapse this exact way. TREA’s instant posting eliminates this scenario entirely.
• Not checking their CE hours until it’s too late. TREC LARS shows your exact CE transcript. Check it quarterly. Surprises happen — a course you thought was posted, wasn’t. A provider made an error. Catching it early gives you time to fix it.
• Assuming the broker is tracking it. Your broker is responsible for a lot of things. Monitoring individual agent CE deadlines is not typically one of them. This is on you.

What Happens When a License Expires

Since October 2023, TREC changed the rules. Expired licenses go inactive immediately. TREC also terminates your brokerage affiliation on the spot. Until you reinstate, you cannot practice real estate. The safest approach is to never let it get close. Even better: use a provider that posts your hours instantly — so you can renew the same night you finish.

All of that said, here’s what the full renewal actually costs so there are no surprises.

TREC Renewal Costs: What to Budget

Most agents overestimate what renewal costs. Here’s the full picture:

The CE deferral option ($200) lets you renew without completing CE first — but the license goes inactive. You still owe the full CE hours to reactivate later. It costs more and solves nothing. Do the CE.

Beyond the numbers, agents usually have a few more questions before they enroll. Here are the ones that come up most.

Frequently Asked Questions

Quick answers to what agents ask most. For more, see our frequently asked questions page.