-
Quick Tour
Connect. Share. Learn.Welcome to ActiveRain, the #1 social community for real estate professionals.- Explore the world's largest storehouse of real estate knowledge
- Access free training on ActiveRain University
- Share the experience of life in the real estate industry
- Grow your business through real estate blogging
- Blogs
-
Resources
Product Reviews Curious as to what others in your profession think about a certain product or tool? AR's community takes the time to leave honest and transparent reviews of their experiences so you can be a bit wiser about your purchase.
- Broken down by categories and subcategories for easy finds
- Get an unfiltered look at what real users are saying
- Leave a review yourself for others to benefit from
- Add new products as you use them and gain points for doing so
|
Posted by 
;)
;)
;)
Find WA real estate agents and Seattle real estate on ActiveRain.
Disclaimer: ActiveRain Corp. does not necessarily endorse the real estate agents, loan officers and brokers listed on this site. These real estate profiles, blogs and blog entries are provided here as a courtesy to our visitors to help them make an informed decision when buying or selling a house. ActiveRain Corp. takes no responsibility for the content in these profiles, that are written by the members of this community.
© 2013 ActiveRain Corp. All Rights Reserved
50 Comments on The Secret Open House in Seattle ... Courtesy of the MLS
Jo: Forward this on to your fellow agents. I wonder how many people it would take to turn this thing around?
Colleen: We know who dominates the board.
The MLS is a coop op site not a public advertising site. If you are worried about paying for print ad, which I feel is still the best way to advertise an open house find a brokerage that has ad space avaible to their agents at no extra charge or atleast the first couple of print ads. Maybe get Re/Max to start advertising Opens on their websites. I know Windermere does and I believe JLS as well. The MLS does not care who sweeps their info, their main goal is provided information between license agents and creat an agreement for compensation.
Interesting question... we certainly have a category for our company, corporate and personal websites to advertise up coming open houses.
However, I can certainly see why it would not be allowed with adding it to the remarks in the MLS. Working with buyers and setting up several auto searches that automatically sends properties over in a brochure view could cause problems if buyers just showed up to the open houses without us.
I don't know about your area, but in ours many of the agents sitting open houses are not the actual listing agent, they are agents in the same office as the actual listing agents looking to pick up buyers. Agents holding the open house automatically think they are the "procurring cause" because they were sitting the open house when buyers came wandering in without their agent.
My opinion, but there are several sources to promote open houses for absolutely free including R.com, websites, AR, etc.. etc.. Which as you've stated... are far more effective then print media.
Wow! Susan, that pretty much sucks! We even have an "Add Open House" function that buyers can tap into. I use it in addition to the Washington Post and Craig's List, and we're starting to get a lot of visits from the MLS thing. I mean, that is what MLS is for as far as I'm concerned. You should check out the Houston Association of Realtors public site. I think it's the best one I've ever seen, because it includes open information right on the pubic listing page.
Tell you MLS to grow up!
When the market turned sour, so did the MLS. Abuse not only in the remarks but OOPS, branded tours, OOPS a propertly listed in the wrong community, OOPS the wrong square footage, OOPS four bedrooms instead of two.
I report data errors all the time, they never seem to get fixed.
Data entry errors my hind end!
Renee - I see those "mistakes" all the time lately. I also report them, and the MLS does get them fixed. Not sure if they fine the people, too, or not.
My favorite is a picture of the listing agent's sign with their phone # and web address mixed in among the pictures of the house.
John, Len, Don, and Anne:
1. First of all I want thank you for your thoughtful comments. The only thing I can say about your concern with your buyers going to open houses on their own is to stress the importance of a buyer agency agreement. I think if the only thing that's keeping a buyers loyalty to their agent is access to information then that agent has bigger problems than published open houses.
2. I hold all of my listings open the first weekend; more as a courtesy to my fellow agents. I would never think of trying to steal their buyers. On the contrary I want to make it as easy as possible for my fellow agents to show and sell my listings and even though there are a few bad apples, I think most agents have the same respect for these relationships.
2. I do agree that the MLS shouldn't be used for agent promotion. I just don't happen to think posting the time of an open house is promoting an agent. I see it as a more transparent way of doing business.
Susan - here in Connecticut, buyer agency agreements are mandatory when we're working with buyers. So, that is not the issue.
The issue is that IDX is now a part of our profession. When prospects are using our personal websites, if they see on the listings that there is an open house, then our personal website may have just generated a client for the agent who is hosting the open house. Possibly not even the listing agent. Keep in mind that we market our websites. Prospects that we have not met with will be searching our sites. Why should the IDX feeds on our sites direct them to another agent? That's not the intent of IDX.
On the other hand - I welcome all agents' clients to my open houses. I will gladly let them view the home during the open house. And I will gladly accept an offer on that home from the other agent with no issues at all as to who was the procuring cause. A sale from an open house is still a sale, no matter who the buyers' agent is!
It sounds to me like you should contact your MLS board, get involved somehow, and try to change the rule.
You certainly have a lot of support for your arguement about Open Houses.
I know that before I joined the board of our local MLS, I wondered what they did.
Now I know, and am working on changing the things I don't like about it.
Patrick: That's great for the buyers who are searching Windermere's site but what about the buyers who are on JLS, CBB, Re/Max or God forbid Redfin? Everyday it seems like there's a new website for buyers and it would make all of our lives a lot simpler if we could just post our open house time on the most searched site and have it swept.
Debbie: Your in the majority so far.
Michael: I think we need to start questioning.
Joe: I agree completely.
Lisa: I'm going to do that too.
Melina: I appreciate your point but since the majority of the MLS's allow open house info to be made public I think we should have that ability as well.
Gary: That seems to be the case here.
Shannon: I think you're going to miss your Yakima MLS.
Bob and Carolin: Thanks for the feedback.
Wayne: That's all I'm looking for.
This blog kind of got a way from me and I want to appologize for taking so long to respond to all of the thoughtful and engaging comments. It has certainly given me a lot to think about.
James: I think I'll look into that.
Courtney, Lori, Richard and Christy: That's 4 more for transparency.
Paul: I have my buyers present one of my busines cards to every open house agent, the minute they walk through the door. It saves a lot of trouble.
Maureen: That's 1 more for the MLS.
Patricia: Our Mls has actually grown old and stogdy.
Renee and Don: I just saw that sort of thing this morning.
Don: Thanks for your considered comment.
Adam: Good Advice!
Terrylynn: I think it's a case of the tail wagging the dog!