a giant step for REBNY, but how big a step for humankind? Listings web portal coming in the Spring
Springtime data shower expected
This afternoon brought an email and press release to us members of the Residential Division of the Real Estate Board of New York about the deluxe spanking brand new (in Spring 2007) “web portal” to be established by REBNY through which members of the public will be able to access “accurate and current” information about the exclusive listings of REBNY member firms. Presumably, REBNY will post the release on its website soon.
“Creating an easy-to-use interface for the typically more than 10,000 listings will put the comprehensive data at the public’s fingertips.” [says REBNY President Steve Spinola]
The service will provide New York homebuyers with a useful tool that arms consumers with a wealth of valuable information about prices for comparable homes. Visitors to the portal will be able to specify the characteristics of their ideal home, such as number of bedrooms and bathrooms, location, price and other amenities. The portal would then generate a list of homes meeting the specified criteria and supply broker contacts for each.
The 300+ members of the REBNY Residential Division whose exclusive listings will populate this web portal include all of the major firms doing business in Manhattan and nearly all of the moms-and-pops. The web portal will feed through the inter-broker system that member firms use to advise each other of exclusive listings under REBNY’s “three day rule” for sharing information.
A few first-blush comments:
I hope REBNY will make more of an effort to make sure the information is both “accurate and current”. I frequently hear agents complain about information shared through the REBNY Listing Service that is neither accurate nor current.
This should NOT be confused with the classic Multiple Listing Services that serve brokers in the rest of America, as this will be for current listings only. REBNY firms do not share closed sale information with each other, though the change in NYS law this year means that coop sales data will dribble into the public as the city’s data base spits it out. It remains to be seen how much information that agents share even about current listings will be in this public web portal.
The 30+ members of the Manhattan Association of Realtors® (probably all of whom are also REBNY members) already maintain a Manhattan Multiple Listing Service that provides public access to member firms’ listings (about 15% of the market) and even have an Internet Data Exchange system (IDX, like out there in America) in which member firm listings appear on each other’s websites directly. MANAR firms also share closed sale information with each other immediately. My understanding is that MANAR was formed, in part, because REBNY did not want to share more than its member firms were already sharing. So the politics of this will be something to ponder over the coming days.
What will the New York Times think? Currently, NYTimes.com is the closest thing there is to a public “web portal” for listings. (NYTimes.com is notorious for running ads for properties that do not exist, as well as ads for properties that have long since gone into contract or closed.) I have been told that the Times was able to charge the big firms to create that website at the Times And – obviously – it charges to have listings put up there. Will this kill NYTimes.com?
Cynics might wonder whether there is any connection between this proposed web portal (why announce six months in advance??) and the inquiries by the federal Department of Justice into Manhattan real estate practices.
No word on whether there will be a REBstimate tool, but don’t count on it.
© Sandy Mattingly 2006
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