Brokers and MLSs formulate concerns over new IDX recommendations

There is a work group that recommends changes to NAR’s MLS Policy Committee on changes to the policy. This work group recently submitted suggested changes that, if adopted, would enable RSS and other electronic means of syndicating listings to third parties. Brokers and MLSs alike are very concerned about the potential infringements on the copyrights of brokers and MLSs, and the potential for law suits from home sellers. Broker participants are legally liable for the listing content as outlined in the listing contract with the seller. The broker takes on the legal responsibility for the listing through the contact. Moreover, the convents [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:25:43-07:00April 18th, 2011|Broker-Agent Information, Main category, MLS Insights|Comments Off on Brokers and MLSs formulate concerns over new IDX recommendations

The Realty Alliance and Nation’s largest brokers want IDX Reform

In a press release today, The Realty Alliance joined the ranks of Leading RE and other brokers who are making an effort to overturn the recent actions by the NAR MLS Policy Committee to extend IDX privileges to franchise organizations. Chief rationale is that only the procuring broker may authorize and share their listing data with anyone who is not a member of the MLS. Press Release: Joe Horning, Chairman of the Board, The Realty Alliance LARGE BROKERS ASK FOR REPEAL OF FRANCHISE EXEMPTION FOR IDX The Board of Directors of The Realty Alliance sent a letter yesterday to the [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:25:44-07:00April 18th, 2011|Main category|Comments Off on The Realty Alliance and Nation’s largest brokers want IDX Reform

IDX Data Use Workgroup Submits Recommendations

I just received a copy of the Report of Recommendations of the IDX Use Work Group of the Multiple Listing Issuse and Policies Committee. I have had a blur of calls from The Realty Alliance, Leading RE, MLSs and Franchises alike today. There are many significant concerns. At the heart of the recommendations is the new rule that IDX listing content may be distributed by RSS or other electronic means (anyway you want) to any third party without any restrictions what so ever. Brokers and Agents still have restraints on the use and display of the data on their own [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:25:44-07:00April 15th, 2011|Broker-Agent Information, Main category, MLS Insights|Comments Off on IDX Data Use Workgroup Submits Recommendations

LPS going to bat for Franchise Organizations

In an op ed column released today, LPS suggests that NAR’s MLS Policy Committee made a poor choice in forbidding Franchises (like Century 21, Coldwell Banker, RE/MAX, Keller Williams, et al) from allowing them to display advertising around IDX listings. Here is the article   Why the NAR’s IDX Policy Kills Competition By Shiraz Vartanian With the publication of the NAR Handbook on Multiple Listing Policy in January of this year, the National Association of REALTORS policy has changed to now allow national franchisors to index IDX listings on their Websites. While this is a positive development - and one that [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:25:44-07:00April 13th, 2011|Main category|Comments Off on LPS going to bat for Franchise Organizations

NAR getting negative feedback on #RPPSI

RPPSI, or REALTOR Party Political Survival Initiative got off on the wrong foot, so far. What NAR is trying to do as an advocate for REALTORS and property owners is admirable, but the execution of the strategy will need to improve if the initiative is to find success. They are getting almost 100% negative feedbackfrom the members on thier website. It breaks my heart to see NAR fail when good guidance in Washington is desperately needed. I learned about #RPPI on Twitter. A nice blog post that summarized the initiatives was found on the Arizona REALTORS blog here. From there I registered [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:25:45-07:00April 10th, 2011|Broker-Agent Information, Main category|Comments Off on NAR getting negative feedback on #RPPSI

The Real Goal of RPR and CoreLogic

I just returned from speaking at the Leading Real Estate Companies of the World conference in Las Vegas. Leading RE is an amazing group of independent brokerages from across the nation and the world. The Leading RE network represents the largest non-franchise organizations from every marketcenter - I think they have about 600 broker members. Admittedly, my talk to the brokers likely represented the most boring session at the conference - Data Licensing, Listing Syndication, and an explaination of new IDX policies from the NAR MLS Policy committee. Notwithstanding, a few hundred broker owners joined the meeting indicating that they [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:25:47-07:00March 11th, 2011|Broker-Agent Information, Main category, MLS Insights|Comments Off on The Real Goal of RPR and CoreLogic

GSEs NAR Profit and Welfare

What happens next in the financial markets of the mortgage industry is up in the air. Our current system is a failure when markets go down. It cripples our industry, the financial markets, and millions of consumers. The National Association of REALTORS released their reform recommendations. As one of the chief lobbying groups in Washington DC, you can bet that government is listening. They highlight the issues. Government Sponsored Entities are problematic. Anytime you have an artificial business that shares profits when times are good, and gets bailed out by taxpayers when times are bad - risk of collapse is high. [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:25:51-07:00February 17th, 2011|Broker-Agent Information, Main category, MLS Insights|Comments Off on GSEs NAR Profit and Welfare

CoreLogic Marketlinx publishing InfoNet Licensing partners

The places one finds business intelligence these days….. Twitter! If you follow@marketlinxnews on twitter, you will see their rather casual announcements of each instance that an MLS or Association enters into a licensing agreement for InfoNet.InfoNet is CoreLogic’s data licensing program whereby they license active listing content from MLSs (and pay them for it) then sell access to the data via their AVM products to the federal government, banks, freddie, fannie, insurance companies and the like. Their only competitor in this marketplace is NAR’s subsidary, the Realtor Property Resource. They also build an AVM called the RVM (Realtor Valuation Model) [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:25:53-07:00February 3rd, 2011|Main category, MLS Insights|Comments Off on CoreLogic Marketlinx publishing InfoNet Licensing partners

WAV Group Property Indexing White Paper

WAV Group is proud to release this property indexing white paper to explain NAR’s policy on indexing listings. The paper provides an overview of indexing, the process used by search engines to catalog information on the internet. Click the image to download the paper for free. In order for MLSs to enforce IDX rules and regulations, they must understand indexing. Furthermore, anyone operating an IDX website needs to understand indexing and the advantages that it offers to search engine optimization and online competition. Non-IDX property search websites like Trulia, realtor.com and others have been indexing listings for years, and as [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:25:56-07:00December 12th, 2010|Main category, MLS Insights, Reports, Suveys and Research|Comments Off on WAV Group Property Indexing White Paper

How about a new real estate organization to separate the wheat from the chaff?

Lani Rosales at Agent Genius.com wrote an interesting article about whether there are too many REALTORS in the market at this point. While I understand why many would suggest that the market may, in fact, be oversaturated, I would argue that NAR serves a valuable purpose as a political organization. The more members, the more influence.  There’s nothing wrong with its role as THE advocate for the real estate industry. Instead of trying to revamp NAR, I would love to see a new organization meant only for top producers and  highly trained professionals new to the industry. The entry stakes would be [...]

By |2018-11-08T02:43:10-08:00November 13th, 2010|Main category|Comments Off on How about a new real estate organization to separate the wheat from the chaff?

REALTOR.com renews agreement with MSN

The leader in online property search is REALTOR.com, operated by their parent company Move, Inc. In an announcement today, Move renewed the agreement with MSN to power their property search. Move has been under considerable pressure from upstarts, Trulia and Zillow who have been skirmishing to secure relationships with newspapers and other portals to power their search. Recently Zillow announced a partnership with Yahoo! Beginning soon, all listings sent to Zillow will also appear on realestate.Yahoo.com. Move shores up their position of the aggregate leader with this renewal of MSN - targeting more than 18 Million consumers on a monthly [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:25:58-07:00November 2nd, 2010|Main category|Comments Off on REALTOR.com renews agreement with MSN

LPS Granted License to Sell RPR RVM(TM) Product to Lender Community

Lender Processing Services announced a new valuation model for Lenders that brings listing and pending-sale data into the AVM equation.  The mortgage and real estate services provider has struck an agreement with the National Association of REALTORS to productize MLS data derrived from the REALTOR Property Resource (RPR) to create derivitive products for Lenders. In this case, LPS is offering a product called the LPS REALTOR Valuation Model or (RVM) According to the release, LPS plans to leverage this information to expand the reach of traditional automated valuations. In a quote, Rober Walker, managing director, valuations for LPS Applied Analytics [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:25:59-07:00October 26th, 2010|Main category|1 Comment