Realtor.com released a major site update in beta yesterday. I’m at 37,000 feet as I write this and don’t have much time, but wanted to offer a few quick observations:
- The site now features recent solds from nearly 50 MLSs (that number will surely grow soon, public record data fills the gaps in the meantime). Sales histories, tax histories, neighborhood data, school data and oodles of data points also hang off every listing. This great for end users, but there will are some in the industry who will think participating MLSs crossed the line by feeding this data to a public site. I happen to disagree with that perspective, but this is going to raise a few hackles.
- Along similar lines, my first reaction was to try and think how the RPR – which sits behind a digital moat – and this site, which is public, are meaningfully different. It’s a question filled with all kinds of political hot potatoes. I’m cool with a public site featuring tons of data that helps Realtors market themselves and their listings, but I’m not sure it’s going to go down too well in the RPR camp. I’m cool with that too.
- The user experience is significantly improved. It’s fast. And the faceted search functionality is really well done. Both of these things can be chalked up to the dev work on Move.com’s “Find” app which was, interestingly, originally built for use by the RPR.
- The “Find a Realtor” tool is a major development – or at least it will be when the kinks are worked through (results for the neighborhoods I searched were a little muddled.) As of right now, you can search for a Realtor in any area by the number of active listings they have. I know: sales activity is not a perfect measure of aptitude, but it’s a darn good place to start. If I’m going to sell my home, I can now quickly find the Realtors in my neighborhood who are really working – and discount those who aren’t. The Houston Association of Realtors did something similar a few weeks ago, and I think we’ll continue to see more of it.
- I wish they would stop confusing new listing email alert, saved search and favorite property functionality by bundling it in something they’re calling “Search Assist.” Call things what they are, place them where people are most likely to use them and invite interaction with them with clear calls to action (e.g. – “Get new listings via email”). Trulia does this really well.
- I think it’s time Realtor.com (and every other online listings site) started labeling “Featured listings” accurately. They are “Advertisements.”
More to come …
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The big deal here is giving the sold data to people freely. I’m so confused on whether this is idx exploitation by just giving out the mls sold data, or whether it is a vow and realtors will now flip a switch so their clients can see the sold data. This also royally screws custom vows, if comsumers can get this data without being tied to a realtor, on realtor.com. Fsbos are going to love getting the mls details, photos, and remarks, to help them price their home. Even if realtor.com is doing a vow, rather than idx-showing-of-solds, they should require that consumers sign agency and disclosures before getting access to the the sold data, not just click-to-agree to tos. No matter which way you look at it, the more data and tools that are put in consumers hands the less work they become for realtors. This is what chapter 2 of freakonomics talked about. We will eventually see a big consolidation in the number of realtors and significant changes to commissions because of this. I personally, think realtor.com has gone to far in taking our data, giving it to the public, and then charging us extensively for ads. I want to know how will providing mls data to realtor.com actually help any realtor. If realtor.com freely gives away the mls sold data, this should hurt the terabitz vows, zip realty, and any sensible brokerage that actually requires the consumer to be their client to get access to the mls sold data online. Sorry my frusterated ideas are jumbled, I’m in a hurry writting this.
I did a quick fly-by on the site and saw several things that concerned me. First, the estimate of value was all over the place – homes valued at $600,000 selling for 3 times that amount and vice-versa.
Next, the “Find a Realtor” tool is worthless. I searched for the ZIP code where I live and work and got hundreds of agents – many of whom live 40-50 miles away. Checking their sales activity on our local MLS, they haven’t sold anything in the subject ZIP code in years, if at all. A query that returns those kinds of results will just confuse consumers.
I applaud Realtor.com in attempting to empower consumers, but just like Zillow and Trulia, the user has to take what they see with a grain of salt.
[...] Brian Boero’s thoughts on the new Realtor.com beta site (via 1000Watt): “The site now features recent solds from nearly 50 MLSs (that number will surely [...]
Aloha Brian – Would you consider featuring your own listings on a brokerage website as advertisements? There’s a hot debate around this topic at Hawaii Life.
Justin – If the traffic/distribution were significant enough, maybe.
[...] languages they speak, and the number of listings they are representing…” And also 1000 Watt Consulting.com. “The user experience is significantly improved. It’s fast. And the faceted search [...]