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Realtors plot statewide database to combat Zillow, Redfin and other apps

Open House Sign
Open House Sign

Is the Realtor, run property listing service in California obsolete?

Several brokers, agents and “multiple listing service” operators expressed concern during a panel discussion Wednesday that commercial websites like Zillow, Redfin and Realtor.com have overtaken the patchwork of industry databases agents use to find homes for clients.

“The world of big data doesn’t seem to have come to the MLS in any meaningful way,” said David Silver-Westrick, a partner at San Clemente-based Keller Williams OC Coastal Realty. “We’re missing the boat on lots of big data opportunities. To the extent that consumers have better tools than we do, we just become irrelevant.”

The California Association of Realtors sponsored Wednesday’s event, held at CAR headquarters in Los Angeles, to plot the future of broker-run MLS sites and to find ways to meet the association’s 12-year-old goal of forming a single, statewide database in California. There currently are more than 40 MLS’s in California.

Agents use the MLS to disseminate information about homes for sale, providing property details as well as insider information about showings and compensation.

The statewide MLS effort so far has led to the formation of the Diamond Bar-based California Regional Multiple Listing Service, which currently represents most of Southern California and the Bay Area. CRMLS includes more than 92,000 agents and 37 local Realtor associations. But that’s still less than half the local associations in the state and doesn’t include San Francisco, Ventura County and most of Santa Barbara County, according to the MLS’s website.

“I think that there is an opportunity that is fast fading,” said CRMLS CEO Art Carter. “If we do not do it shortly, then we will forever be chasing others that will most likely take the handles and move forward.”

Other panelists lamented MLS problems include inaccurate and outdated data as well as the lack of consolidation.

“As someone who lists and sells real estate, I need it to be more efficient,” said Jeanne Radsick, an agent with Century 21 Tobias Real Estate in Bakersfield. “I need to not have to go to multiple sources to find what I’m looking for.”

Technology isn’t an issue, panelists said. Carter said a statewide MLS could be established in three months once the paperwork is in place.

The main obstacle is politics. Concerns among agents and brokers include the question of who controls broker information — the MLS or the brokers themselves. MLS employees also worry about losing their jobs under a consolidated system. And smaller MLS sites fear larger, out-of-area brokerages will take away their business if the outsiders have access to property data in their areas.

“The politics (is) on the local level with (small) MLS’s. You can’t even get Arrowhead and Big Bear to talk, and they’re right next door to each other,” said Sandra Deering, a broker with Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage in Newport Beach. “The reality is those people are still protective of their jobs. … They don’t have the bandwidth, I don’t think, to see beyond their day-to-day operation. I don’t know how to overcome that.”

Deering has to join 25 MLS sites for her business, “and just managing the licensing, the payment process is a full-time staff person,” she said.
“These changes in the environment, particularly on the consumer side, have given the consumer … the ability to have information that is equivalent, if not superior, to what the agents have,” said Joel Singer, CEO of the state Realtor association. “The question is can this current structure survive? Or perhaps the question is should this current structure survive if it doesn’t alter.”

Singer said that when he bought a house last year, the MLS data from his broker “didn’t compare very well to the data that I got when I signed up with Redfin. … Is this a problem for us?”

Carter and other panelists see a statewide MLS as a precursor to forming a nation-wide system.

“It’s a process of becoming a lot more aggressive,” Carter said. “Consolidate with the willing and (share data) with the unwilling to consolidate and go around those that are just willing to do neither.”

Source: Redfin California

Zillow CEO responds to new competition from Facebook and Amazon

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As one of the largest, if not the biggest, players in online real estate listings, Zillow is watching its list of competitors rapidly grow with more and more companies eyeing the potential in the real estate market.

Zillow may dominate the space right now, raking in $266.9 million in revenue in the second-quarter of 2017, but top-producing companies like Amazon and Facebook have recently encroached in Zillow’s territory.

But the small moves from others in the industry to take some of Zillow’s long-standing dominance isn’t enough to scare the CEO.

It is enough, however, for investors to ask Spencer Rascoff, CEO of Zillow Group, about the growing competition. Zillow Group includes brands like Zillow, Trulia,SreetEasy, HotPads, and Naked Apartments.

Slipping in an answer to one more question that was submitted online before wrapping up the earnings call, Rascoff answered the question, “What do you see from Amazon and Facebook in real estate?”

Here’s Rascoff’s full response:

“With respect to Facebook, as I’ve already said, our partnership there is strong and advertisers/agents view us as an effective way to buy Facebook advertisements, more effective than from buying it directly from Facebook. In the case of either of these horizontal players, I do think it’s very difficult for horizontal players to compete with vertical companies that are focused on the vertical and have as big a brand as our family of brands have. And I do think it’s also important to understand how this ad product that we have differs from other ad products. We saw an ad product that connects the consumer with the real estate professional at the time and place that they’re shopping for a specific home. That’s very different from Amazon’s rumored directory of real estate agents or Facebook’s ad product that tries to drive traffic back to a brokerage website. So, a lead generation product that’s tied to a home search is quite different, and I think will always be more attractive to an advertiser than a branding ad product or a product that tries to drive traffic to their website. So those are some of our concluding thoughts on our ability to compete with horizontal players.”

The competition from Amazon is not nearly as concrete as the competition from Facebook.

Back in July, Amazon quietly made a move in to the real estate industry. Tucked into the website’s Home and Business Services section, where users can receive quotes from professionals for various services including assembling new purchases or setting up new technology, Amazon listed a “Hire a Realtor” webpage. But the page wasn’t up long and was taken down the same day HousingWire reported on it.

The announcement from Facebook was a lot more prominent and actually happened shortly before Zillow reported its earnings. Earlier this week, Facebook rolled out Dynamic Ads for Real Estate allow brokers and agents to advertise their listings directly to Facebook and Instagram users who searched for properties on the broker’s website.

An article by Monica Nickelsburg in GeekWire explained that the ads would compete with Zillow’s product, which allows real estate agents to advertise to prospective homebuyers and sellers on its site, according to the article.