Pocket listings are bad for consumers — period

“But we got the home sold for what the seller wanted, and it was less hassle for them! That’s all that matters.”

Well, except you’ll never know if being available on the open market would have brought a higher price. And yes, the seller’s needs matter. So do the needs of the real estate industry. Your seller was not best served by withholding their listing from the MLS. They just weren’t. And if you publicly market their house, their privacy is gone, MLS or not.

The client doesn’t always know best. If you have a buyer client who says, “I don’t want to live in a black neighborhood,” are you going to chant, “all that matters is what the client wants” mantra?”

Jay Thompson

This is a brilliantly written piece. It should be required reading for anyone making decisions about pocket listings and the MLS. Jay goes over the differences between “coming soon” listings (as opposed to “here and now”) and “pocket listings” along with other nuances in the market. Bravo Jay.

#PutItOnTheMLS

I’m impressed with Bright MLS‘ response to Compass’ “pre-litigation” letter. Brian Donnellan letter showed leadership and had very cogent responses to Compass’ concerns.

Here are a few things I found interesting in both these letters and other scuttlebutt.

From the Compass letter…

“The policy is further problematic because of Bright’s high market share, and the fact that the MLS is an essential service.”

Cory Perkins, Compass

Someone should tell Cory that the broker’s narrative is that there are too many MLS organizations.

A couple things from Brian’s letter back to Compass

As you are aware, we reached out to Compass’ executive team multiple times for feedback in advance of announcing this Policy. In response, we were informed by one Compass executive that the company had “no opinion” on the Policy and were told by a second executive that he “agreed with the core tenets of the Policy.” Two weeks after we provided you with a draft of the Policy, I personally responded to your email on October 16 with another offer to meet and discuss it – but
you did not respond.

Brian Donnellan, Bright MLS

This is chickenshit on Compass’ part. Why is it that nobody can just pick up the phone and work things out anymore? Your first move is to send a “pre-litigation letter” and make it public? Not a good look.

“Bright is standing up for Fair Housing

History has shown that many times listings are kept out of the MLS to avoid–whether or not intentionally–certain demographic subsets of potential buyers or to circumvent the rules applicable to MLS listings that promote standards for ethical and complete information.”

Brian Donnellan, Bright MLS

Fuck yeah! When I first read Compass’ letter I had my own take. I’ve been writing about how I thought that the Fair Housing concerns were not brought up enough in regard to the pocket listing debate. It’s great to see Bright MLS show leadership again, especially in this area.

I also heard that in some costal cities Compass is very successful at double-ending many deals, over 30%. Which means they can offer attractive splits to their agents, which also helps recruiting efforts. So this is a real threat to their business model.

Last thing is that I’ve heard through the grapevine is Compass does not have the same problem with MRED’s implementation of 8.0. I’m not sure what the big differences are between Bright MLS “coming soon” policy and MRED’s PLN. Could it be Bright MLS’ $5,000 fine? It would be good to get some clarification from Compass regarding their stance about this.

Still a lot of days left till NAR Annual. ????