Is Realtor.com's pricing getting out of hand?

It's all about profits for the corporation...oh I mean...the association.  Gee, I get confused over the difference!!!  :)

Realtor.com is expensive but I must say that at least in my area (Massachusetts) it does bring quite a few buyer clients to my properties. If you do a good job enhancing your properties with extra photos and some well written text, it will certainly help. There is no doubt that realtor.com has a massive reach.

I agree with Jennifer here, none of our buyers find their houses on Realtor.com. In fact , they all complain about how hard it is to look for what they want on Realtor.com. The polls we have taken say that they may start there but get frustrated and move to a simpler way, they get into the regions mls via a website of a different kind, lots do it with AOL and Yahoo.Our website has our MLS on it for the entire State and people love it because it is easy so with SEO a simpler version can be found by your potential buyers.  Katerina

Hello Jennifer, You obviously raised a question that got a lot of people expressing their disappointments with REALTOR.com and a lot of opinion was generated. I found the comments to your post very telling. I worked for a lot of years volunteering at the local,state and national level and learning that most in the industry now have moderate to strong resentments with their experience. At a time when the whole of organized real estate is under attack, not based on the model of its aspirations but in the daily practice and the current business models.

The directors in place have no real way venue in place to reach out to the individual members and this aspect alone may be its undoing. For many years now, it has been about the money. The 70+ billion a year generated in earning just in the residential section alone. With that kind of money, it has never been difficult to understand why new business models are in place and the DOJ feels that the information once believed to be the unique domain of the listing brokerage should be within the public domain. The question has not been decided but it is expected by many that when it is, the bond will be broken and a multitude of cottage industries will appear that could in effect un organize organized real estate.

A number of years ago, NAR lobbied strongly for a change in the tax code to afford the $250/$500K exemption for capital gain. It grew the home ownership industry by such proportions making it possible for the gigantic and dynamic increase in home ownership and earned equities. That was then but what have have you done for me lately. Who would or could replace those kinds of efforts?

Craigslist works great for me, but then again there is no MLS in that specific area which I service (Costa Rica).

I am really glad I came across this blog today. I have been fuming privately about realtor.com for 4 months. I paid about $345 the first year for enhanced listings, $600 the second year and this year they wanted $ 2400 BUCKS!!! I reasoned with them and they were very nice, but stopped negotiating at $ 1800. Now, I probaly wold have paid, but I had a terrible year and could not afford it! I had 20 listings and no buyers. They should scale it towards sales and not listings. The more successful I am at listings (no money) the more my fee goes up. And I have never had a sale with my realtor.com listings. Calls, but no money. So my sellers like it, even though I advertise on about 6 other websites, so what....my sellers are not paying me yet in this lousy market in Ohio. So, I am done with them for now and thank god I found Active Rain! Regards, DavidC

As primarily a listing agent... I NEED IT... My clients demand it, and it just may give your the edge you need over the other Realtor competing for the listing. You might want to look into how they are looking at the amount of listings. When you re-list a property that has been expired it counts as a whole new listing. If you have one that falls within two categories on your MLS (like town-home, and investment property) and you have them listed in both places it counts as two seperate listings. I guess the easiest way to explain it is they don't count listings by address. Have them go  through and see how many duplicates you may have and that might get you back down to the previous bracket.

P.S. Remember your target audience!!! If you are representing the seller it brings huge value to them.

Buyers looking for properties... It is still one of the number one searches they go to! I have had several leads from this site. It only takes one transaction to close to pay for itself for the whole year. Not a bad deal.

I decided NOT to renew because I had the same experience as you.  When my renewal came up they upped the cost tremendously and during the time I was with them I never had a customer or client sign on with me. 

I first signed up with realtor.com during my second year into real estate. I enjoyed it because it wasn't that expensive. Once the next year rolled around my cost doubled too so I let it go.  I would tell other people that it wasn't worth it and I still do go business without it.

Lately though I have been going on listing presentations with higher end homes and they ask me if I feature their home so I of course called Realtor.com to check out pricing. It is outrageous but they now offer monthly payments which helps.

Yes, to me it is worth it because of the statistics of how many people really search online through them. I do get leads and requests quite frequently from consumers.

I was really happy with realtor.com for a couple of years, but the more successful I became, the more money they wanted....I went from $600 a year to $2500!! I could not justify this with the return I was getting. Also, when I show sellers all the websites I market their home on (free to me) they are just as happy. RealBird, Craigslist, Trulia, etc....David

Jennifer, I agree with you 110%!  I've rarely had anyone asked specifically about R.com, and when they do and I explain all the other places I expose their home, and that they'll still be on R.com, they're completely happy with it.  It's all about educating and communicating with our clients and showing them proof that what we DO do gets the results they want.  Thanks for the followup info.

I have not been a member of Realtor.com for over a year and I have not missed it at all. My annual fee doubled also and I could not afford it if I wanted too. With all the free ways to post our listings on line why would I pay that much money with no proof of increased business. (I was on enhanced for two years with no sales calls from that site)

With RealBird alone, my listings are automatically transmitted to over a dozen highly trafficked websites for free!!!! I think Realtor.com has been blown away and left in the dust. My clients do not even ask me about it.