Former National Association of REALTORS® President Harley Rouda Sr. died Thursday of natural causes at his home in Columbus, Ohio. He was 83.

Rouda served as president in 1991, the year that NAR launched its push to have state associations make property condition disclosures mandatory. He led NAR through a year of transition for the association and the industry. Some of those changes — such as median existing home prices topping six figures for the first time — were positive, and others — such as NAR’s membership numbers dropping nearly 50,000 in a recession year — were not.

During his presidency, the Appraisal Institute — formerly part of NAR — became an independent institution, and NAR made major forays into international real estate with the creation of its International (now Global) division and the Eastern European Real Property Foundation. The latter organization, formed to promote property rights in former Communist-bloc nations in Eastern Europe, continues today as the International Real Property Foundation.

Well after his presidency, Rouda stayed involved in the association. A REALTOR® Emeritus, he attended every REALTORS® Conference & Expo until the 2010 event in New Orleans. Additionally, he was one of only four people who have thus far donated more than $100,000 to the REALTORS® Political Action Committee. He coined the phrase, “If real estate is your career, then politics is your business,” says his daughter Leslie Rouda Smith, the 2012 NAR vice president and liaison to committees.

Rouda started his real estate business, Harley E. Rouda (HER), REALTORS®, in 1956 in the basement of his Columbus home. It eventually grew to be one of the largest independent brokerages in the United States. (The brand was changed in 2002 to Real Living LLC when it was merged with other real estate businesses by Rouda’s son, Harley Rouda Jr., who is the current president of that company, now a unit of Brookfield Residential Property Services.)

In central Ohio, Rouda is remembered for a couple of ventures that built his company’s name recognition, recalls Leslie Rouda Smith. The first was the HER Cookbook, a compendium of local recipes he distributed to consumers free as a marketing tool. The second was a vaudeville show Rouda put on called Realvillities, which featured performances by local REALTORS®, often including Rouda himself.

“He was extremely charismatic. He was probably the best joke teller that any of us have ever known,” Rouda Smith says. His specialty, she says, was an impression of Freddy the Freeloader that matched Red Skelton’s.

She adds that he’ll continue to be remembered among REALTORS® for his good humor and generosity.

“He was an innovator and a people person,” Rouda Smith says. “He was very respected, even by competitors. If anyone wanted advice, he was the go-to guy.”

— Brian Summerfield, REALTOR® Magazine