Fox and Roach Reports Success With Buyside

There are a lot of technology applications that look promising, none more so than the recent launch of their Home Valuation System on foxroach.com powered by Buyside™. Fox and Roach is the largest Berkshire Hathaway Home Services company. Their offices cover many regions including Southeastern Pennsylvania, Southern New Jersey and Delaware. In WAV Group broker website effectiveness studies, BHHS Fox & Roach ranks in the top 10 for the most traffic of any broker in America. Last month, they launched the Home Valuation System, built by Buyside™ that created a landing page for every off- market property and IDX listings [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:23:17-07:00April 20th, 2016|Broker Technology Research, MLS Insights|Comments Off on Fox and Roach Reports Success With Buyside

3 Ways for MLSs to Frustrate and Alienate Brokers

SOLDS, VOWS and the RESO Data Dictionary are NOT Optional for MLSs Some MLSs are creating unnecessary and even illegal challenges for their brokers as well as for the technology suppliers that support their brokers, by not complying with NAR rules…some of which that have been in place for YEARS! I hear regularly from brokers and technology vendors that they run into roadblocks all the time when they try to access SOLDs for their IDX feed, a Virtual Office Website (VOW) data feed and most recently, the RESO Data Dictionary dataset. I’m going to start with a little history lesson [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:23:18-07:00April 20th, 2016|Broker Technology Research, MLS Insights|Comments Off on 3 Ways for MLSs to Frustrate and Alienate Brokers

Upstream Update From CMLS

CMLS gets the scoop on this latest UpstreamRE release. Kathy Condon of CMLS was able to connect with UpstreamRE spokesperson Craig Cheatham to catch up on the progress made on the development side in the first three months of the year since the vendor agreement was signed. As a reminder, CMLS is hosting a “bring it to the table” meeting on Tuesday, May the 10th in Washtington D.C. For those of you attending the NAR Midyear meetings – you may want to fly in a day early for this meeting. It’s one of the best ways to get a 360 [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:23:18-07:00April 12th, 2016|MLS Insights|Comments Off on Upstream Update From CMLS

The New Process for RFPs in Real Estate

This change was caused by a quiet revolution. During the Y2K surge that transitioned software from mainframe to browser, there was recognition that the old process of software development was too bureaucratic, slow, and overly regimented. An alternative to traditional project management that emerged in the early 2000s is called Agile software development. They use terms like Scrum, Extreme Programing, Dynamic System Development Method, Feature-Drive Development and many others. The overarching focus of all of these methodologies is to deliver frequent, high quality working software, delivered in “sprints,” which are measured in weeks, not months. The result is continuous improvement. [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:23:19-07:00March 30th, 2016|Broker Technology Research, MLS Insights|Comments Off on The New Process for RFPs in Real Estate

Is Real Estate Still in a Slump?

After the crash in the housing market, real estate was hit by the worst recession in our nation’s history. Frankly, brokers took a beating and operated at a loss for a number of years. Since the low point, things have been steadily been improving. There was a lot of speculation that the foreclosure volume in the hardest hit markets were clogging up the supply side. As we turned the corner, these distressed properties were slowly released into the marketplace and they are mostly absorbed. There was a two to three year heyday for brokers and agents who specialized in REO [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:23:20-07:00March 28th, 2016|Broker-Agent Information, How to Make Strategic Planning Really Work in your MLS, MLS Insights, Strategic Planning|Comments Off on Is Real Estate Still in a Slump?

Will the Last PC User Please Turn Out the Lights?

Mobile has gone global and everyone from Wired Magazine, Gartner, Forrester Research, and Barron’s is writing about it. The headline is almost always the same – “THE DEATH OF THE PC HAS NOT BEEN GREATLY EXAGGERATED.” The real headline is that PC sales have been negative since 2011 and the 2015 numbers showed the largest drop in sales volume in history. Before you get overwhelmed with the fear of PCs going away, it will take a long time for that to happen. Shipments of new PCs globally is still running at a pace of around 65 million to 70 million [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:23:20-07:00March 25th, 2016|Broker Technology Research, MLS Insights|Comments Off on Will the Last PC User Please Turn Out the Lights?

The Vision of AMP™ Starting to Become a REALITY thanks to Rapattoni!

A couple of years ago, two of our most progressive clients came to RPR with a new vision about how MLS systems could work. They strongly believed that MLS systems should be offered in modules to make it easier and more practical for brokers and agents to be able to choose the MLS interface that works best for them. Tim Dain from the Austin Board of REALTORS® and Walt Baczkowski from the San Francisco Association of REALTORS® both saw the opportunity to de-couple the listing input, search and reporting functions from the database that houses all of the MLS information [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:23:20-07:00March 24th, 2016|Broker Technology Research, MLS Insights, Press Releases|Comments Off on The Vision of AMP™ Starting to Become a REALITY thanks to Rapattoni!

Using Market Data to Drive Media Coverage

Are you getting published in your local media? Is your firm shaping the way opinion leaders and real estate consumers view critical issues in your housing market Associations, MLSs, and brokerages have access to the best local data ever available on trends in their local markets. Sales, prices, inventories, time on market—every day real estate professionals interpret these and other data to win the confidence of their customers and clients. You have a significant opportunity to turn market data into news that attracts business and establishes credibility. National data services like RealtyTrac and CoreLogic as well as sites like Realtor.com, [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:23:20-07:00March 22nd, 2016|Marketing, MLS Insights|Comments Off on Using Market Data to Drive Media Coverage

IRES® MLS Passes Zillow® In Consumer Engagement

The Internet is the largest free market economy in the world. According to Siri™, 2.954 Billion people use the Internet every month. In the real estate industry, more consumers go to Zillow® than any other single real estate website. But that is changing. Some MLSs like IRES are actually drawing more consumer engagement in their local market and it is making a significant difference to MLS participants. MLSs measure listing engagement with their websites and syndication websites using services like ListHub™ and ListTrac™. These companies either get traffic statistics directly from publishers (like Zillow) or put tracking software on websites that [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:23:21-07:00March 7th, 2016|Broker Technology Research, MLS Insights, Press Releases|Comments Off on IRES® MLS Passes Zillow® In Consumer Engagement

When Regional MLSs Go Bad

There are unfortunate consequences that face brokerages and agents when the relationships between Association shareholders in a regional MLS go bad. They get caught in the crosshairs as the Association shareholders wage war with each other. In many regional MLSs, the governance, vendor agreements, and data rights were not spelled out well enough to enable the regional break up. As a result, the regional MLS becomes a toxic battle of in fighting between Association shareholders that cripples the MLS from functioning. Governance Writing good governance agreements for the regional corporation is very difficult. The best approach is to craft governance [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:23:21-07:00March 4th, 2016|MLS Insights|Comments Off on When Regional MLSs Go Bad

HomeSpotter Revolutionizes MLS Mobile Access

If you have a newer iPhone, you have embraced fingerprint access. You put your finger on the home button which reads your print and opens your phone—or your bank account, or any other app that leverages fingerprint access versus password access. Depending on your MLS, typing in your username and password multiple times a day can be painful, especially on a mobile device. With HomeSpotter, it is just a touch away. HomeSpotter is a mobile MLS application. It provides the benefits of accessing the MLS through a mobile app rather than mobile web. An app provides formatting benefits that mobile [...]

Be a Part of the Change!

WAV Group is a part of strategic plans very often for some of the largest MLSs and Associations in our industry. When conducting strategic plans we hear from brokers and board members that their organization is out of touch with today’s reality. So how do you get your board in touch? You can pay thousands of dollars for several of your board members to attend industry events. Many of these events can be very valuable for the content that is presented, the networking, and peer-to-peer learning. The CMLS conference and the AEI conference are two great opportunities for MLSs and Associations to get in [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:23:23-07:00February 18th, 2016|Broker Technology Research, Broker-Agent Information, Main category, Marketing, MLS Insights, Our Services, Strategic Planning|Comments Off on Be a Part of the Change!