Do you think clients should be able to have direct and unlimited access your local MLS?
- No. (64%, 164 Votes)
- Yes. (36%, 94 Votes)
Total Voters: 258
A recent study by the Center for Data Innovation suggests the exclusivity of regional multiple listing services (MLS’s) are harming consumers, a potential anti-trust issue.
As all practicing California brokers and agents know, each MLS is a database of property listed for sale locally. While most consumers use an online listing aggregator site like Zillow, Trulia, Homes.com or Redfin at some point in their home search to acquire basic information on properties listed for sale, the local MLS holds the most up-to-date and extensive information that is available only to licensed MLS subscribers.
Real estate agents and their brokers pay fees to access and contribute listings to the MLS, which is designed and operated by local real estate associations. These local Associations of Realtors (AORs) engineer the MLS to be heavily regulated and exclusive — keeping this valuable information out of the hands of the general public. Here in California, the largest MLS is the California Regional MLS (CRMLS).
In fact, many real estate brokers erroneously believe they need to be a Realtor® member of the local AOR in order to access or post listings to the local MLS. Rather, licensed brokers may simply pay to be an MLS subscriber or participant, skipping the trade association membership fees and bureaucracy of becoming a member of the AOR and California Association of Realtors® (CAR). [Marin County Board of Realtors, Inc. v. Palsson (1976) 16 C3d 920]
However, paying to access the MLS can add up for some brokerages, which operate across multiple AORs in several states. The study cites online listing aggregators and brokerages like Redfin and Open Listings, which pay millions in fees to access each local MLS. These costs, which vary widely as they are set by each AOR, can be detrimental and destructive for smaller brokerages.
Further, according to the study, an effort is underway at the National Association of Realtors (NAR) to further consolidate listings and enable brokers to block their listings from third-party websites like Zillow, Trulia, etc.
The authors of the study suggest the following regulatory actions be taken:
- State policymakers need to require brokers to provide unlimited access to their listings.
- At the national level, the Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission need to investigate the possibility of collusion by real estate trade unions to block MLS data from online listing aggregators.
In a rebuttal, Redfin’s CEO and Vice President clarify that simply freeing up MLS information so all consumers can access it isn’t enough. In the era of open data, they note the need for websites to share their listings with each other — a data-sharing agreement needs to be reached so that listing aggregators not only can receive MLS data, but they also need to share their data with the MLS.
Related article:
first tuesday’s stance
Access to the MLS has been a long-debated and contentious subject. first tuesday stands on the side of openness and ease of access to all real estate data, including listing data and real estate forms. After all, the more people (brokers, agents, buyers and sellers) who see a listing, the more likely it is to sell quickly and for the most money — the seller’s objective.
But some agents worry that when buyers and sellers have more access to listing data, real estate professionals lose control and will be made obsolete. But this is extremely unlikely to occur, even at a small level.
Buying or selling a house for most families is a once or twice in a lifetime event. As such, people want an experienced guiding hand to walk them through the process. Agents and brokers do much more than simply list and locate properties — they diligently shepherd their clients through the largest financial decision of their lives.
For a recent case study, consider Redfin. When Redfin first started disrupting the buying and selling process, they were basically hands off. They charged a very low 1% fee and didn’t provide their clients with much help at all, aside from broad guidance with legal documents. But they found their business wasn’t taking off because clients wanted more from their trained agents. As a result, Redfin’s brokerage model now looks more like a traditional brokerage, as they have more agents and charge the traditional 3% fee, with a small rebate at the end of the transaction.
Agents and brokers — you’re not going anywhere. Even when clients have the ability to search listings on third-party sites, your experience and expertise are in demand, always. Increasing access to your clients’ listings can only help, especially when you are involved to ensure the data shared is accurate and up-to-date.
There’s really two driving issues on the Access to MLS data question. There is FEAR and there is FUNCTION.
FEAR:
Fear is not all bad. Sometimes it’s run from the tiger. Other times it’s sickly bad: shoot us because we’re walking in a neighborhood while being black. AORs have two fears.
1) Like most private bureaucracies, they fear losing what they control: MLS data. That’s understandable since the first reason they fear losing control of data is money.
2) They fear losing revenue which keeps their management and staff paid, they keep a job.
FUNCTION:
Of the major arenas in America not well structured, Shelter––meaning what humans live in––is failing to serve the optimal benefit that humans, as a capital resource, may contribute to the society in which they live. This is not the place for my treatise on the matter, but suffice to say that imposing more control BASED ON FEAR will always produce dystopian trends.
One possible direction toward solution benefiting sellers, buyers, professionals, and society as a whole would be to structure the acquisition of data by whomever wants it by fee. That removes local AORs fear of job loss.
In an enlightened society––which we don’t have––I agree with Carrie Reyes that the more people see and get informed about any particular property, the more likely it will be sold advantageously. It’s amazing I still see brokers pocket listing their stuff in the greed-ball pursuit of double-ending.
The opposite of pocket listing is broadly listing: listings found ubiquitously. That can happen when people grow up to think in terms of society-wide structure.
Proof….you see, that all the fearful real estate “professionals” today, have zero concern that will happen any time soon. Now they can get back to the business of screwing the clients they claim to serve.
Its only simple data storage and retrieval. Its not a military secret. In fact most claims of copyright are false. Way back in the early 1980s, my office in the San Fernando Valley worked closely with a Utah data firm to create a real-time in-house replica of the MLS. It was complicated back then. It required optical scanning and optical character recognition, which were crude and developing technologies. Of course, we were slammed with the typical copyright claims from the then largest Board of Realtors in the world. We fought back. Since every item of data in the MLS was ultimately authored by an agent, how could the Board claim a copyright? As it turns out, their copyright was limited to the format in which they presented the data and not the data itself. We didn’t copy their format, only their data. They backed off.
Nothing is free. Opening up MLS means giving away something for free. I don’t think it’s fair to tell a private organization how to run itself.
Maybe if zillow, etc., was forced to allow agents to use their service for free, agents would not be so resistant to and open mls concept. Real Estate is changing, has been since I first got into the business in 1972. Agents who stay in, change with the times. The times, in my market, say that the buyer and seller seek an ‘executive assistant’ type service as they are to busy with managing their job, careers, family and hobbies to deal with the pettiness of the details of selling a house and staying out of court. Better to hire a 3rd party who knows their goals and individual needs and will take on the responsibility of executing those duties to the benefit of the contractual parties….. of which the general public is not one. Jc.
Of course First Tuesday supports free access to all since they have made it clear they dispise CAR and the NAR and continually remind us we are not under any obligation to use CAR forms. The MLS was created so brokers have a platform to share information and to facilitate RE transactions. As brokers and agents, we gladly pay a fee for this valuable trade tool as it works well as intended. It should not be given away for free to the public or other real estate websites. Trulia and those other websites information are almost always not current or correct. When clients come to me asking about certain properties they found on those sites, it in inevitably not current or correct. They insist it must be true but when cross referencing with the MLS, much of the time the information proves to be old, incorrect or lacking. Why do I want to give away the main tool that allows me to make a living in a challenging and ever changing industry?
It costs money for the MLS’s to operate. Some people think they are entitled to something for free that someone else pays for? Typical liberal desires. You want unfettered access to a private businesses info? Meet the requirements and pay the money. There is a lot of info on the MLS’s that the homeowners don’t want the general public to have access to. No one likes freeloaders.
Consumers obviously prefer direct access to property listings. The monopolistic middleman (MLS) needs to change drastically and quickly or they will become obsolete. Redfin and Zillow already have a great start…
Monopolistic MLS??? Are you kidding? The MLS is a trade tool, operated for the benefit of real estate brokerages- not for the general public or for trulia or Redfin to access for free. Those companies already skim their information off of realtor.com which gets the mls info to the general public for free.
We pay our dues so the costs of providing the service can be paid for. The MLS exists so we can serve our clients and make a living to support our families. It does not exist so trulia or Redfin can steal our trade info and then profit by it.
Here is an idea: when I post my listing to the mls, trulia can pay me $250 to take the info and post it to their website. Think they will jump on the offer? Probably not since they think for some reason they are entitled to receive it for free. Must be a liberal owned company.
The current voting, 21-7 in favor of not allowing public access, is another sign of an arrogant bunch of realtors, many of whom believe that the general public is too stupid to buy a house without utilizing the charms and vehicles of realtors. The current real estate paradigm is dying fast and unsuspecting agents are going to get sideswiped and wonder what hit them. Those who chose to not wear the blinders issued by the self-serving CAR and NAR will have a better chance of succeeding in the new real estate universe.
This guy gets it.
Arrogant realtors? We own it, we pay for it , we maintain it, and it exists for our use!
With property data available from Zillow, Redfin etc, Board membership value has been drastically diminished. If the outside services are paying to get data access then the data from the Board of Realtors chould be priced at free or a nominal price to local brokers. After all, while the data is the property of the listing broker, and publishing the data is an invitation for participation to other brokers (and Zillow, Redfin viewers as well) , it seems that the profit incentive is granted to those outside services. The Boards of Realtors are non-profit, so why not make the MLS open, charge for it, and have free board membership (and MLS access) for free to local brokers.
Where do you think Zillow and Redfin get their info? They get it by skimming the info of realtor.com for free. Realtor .com exists so realtors can get the MLS info to the general public. As a RE professional, you will not last long in the business if you expect to sell homes by using Zillow , Trulia or Redfin exclusively. Those sites are meant to serve the public-not realtors.