Failed NAR HPR exam twice — what finally helped me pass?

by Marcus T. 20 views3 replies
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Marcus T.OP
May 27, 2026

I've been trying to get my NAR HPR certification for about eight months now and honestly it's been a humbling experience. Failed the first attempt with a 68% (passing is 75%), studied harder, failed the second time with a 71%. At that point I was pretty demoralized and almost gave up on the whole thing.

What turned things around for me was actually doing structured NAR HPR practice test questions instead of just rereading the Code of Ethics material. I'd been treating it like a reading comprehension exam when it's really testing applied judgment in specific high-performance transaction scenarios. The ethics violation questions especially tripped me up because the wrong answers look almost right.

Has anyone else struggled with the dual agency and disclosure sections? I feel like those are where I kept losing points. Would love to hear what study resources or exam tips actually moved the needle for people who passed on their third attempt or later.

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Marcus T.
May 27, 2026
The dual agency questions got me too — my advice is don't memorize rules, practice the scenarios. I spent about 40 hours with a solid NAR HPR study guide that walked through fact patterns, and that's what finally made it click. When you see a weird disclosure situation on the exam, you need to have already seen ten like it. Passed third try with an 82%.
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David K.
May 28, 2026
Honestly the biggest exam tip nobody tells you is to watch your time. I breezed through the first half and then hit the fiduciary duty section and nearly panicked. There's like 15 questions in that cluster and some are genuinely hard. Budget roughly 90 seconds per question max and flag anything you're unsure about — going back saved me at least two or three answers.
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Mike_T
May 28, 2026
Third attempt is often the charm — I've seen it happen dozens of times in my local board study group. The exam clicks differently once you've seen the pattern of how they write wrong answers. Hang in there, you're clearly close.

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