Word on the street is that Alice Myerhoff (@motodot) is leaving Inman News to join Pivot a company headed by Brian Solis specializing “from social brands to social business”. Alice was the SVP of Sales/Business Development at Inman for over 6 years.

I’m going to miss Alice. She would always listen to my crazy sponsorship ideas and sometimes we even implemented them. Please join me in wishing her well.

A few things have been written about MOVE’s latest announcement on the creation of the “Real Estate Network” (REN). MOVE’s says REN will “extend the syndication of property listings to highly trafficked websites operate by real estate franchisors and brokerage networks.”

I have to say I think this is a brilliant strategy on MOVE’s part. Here’s why:

1. Zillow and Trulia have already proven quantity (and quality for that matter) of listing data isn’t necessary to operate a highly trafficked real estate portal.

2. This further hedges MOVE’s position. MOVE currently depends upon its agreement with the National Association of REALTORS (NAR) for listings and does not run a national IDX network.

The big question is “who cares?” So I’m going to focus on a few tipping points that would cause a Franchisor or brokerage network to implement a REN feed on their respective websites.

1. SEO benefits
I think this is the weakest case. Most Franchisors running sophisticated IDX networks from vendors like Homes Media Solutions (formerly eNeighborhoods) and RED (formerly LPS Real Estate Group) have already figured out how to maximize SEO benefits using a platform designed to be a launching site for a “network of broker idx sites”.

2. Cost
This is a big factor. As I’ve stated Zillow and Trulia have already proven quantity of listings doesn’t matter. Aggregating MLS data from multiple sources managing all those different display rules and paying those MLS fees have a huge cost associated with it. What if RE/MAX is paying their IDX vendor $70,000 per month and MOVE is offering REN for $7,000 per month. Is it possible that a company like RE/MAX might opt to save the money? Maybe.

3. The MLS Two Step
This is also a potential decision point. Lets say that a particular MLS provider, for the purposes of this example the Houston Associaiton of REALTORS (HAR) has made is very difficult to display listings from their MLS. The Franchisor always has to jump thru a few extra more hoops when dealing with HAR. Will some Franchisors be willing to forego not having all Houston listings as long was they don’t have to talk to Sam Scott anymore? Maybe : )

4. Filling the gaps
The REN might be a great way for new and exisiting Franchisors to supplement coverage in areas where they don’t have a Franchisee yet. According to the rules they would still need a license in the state, but thats relatively easy. This makes Realty Executives participation as a charter member of REN a little clearer.

5. Exposure.
Search traffic to real estate portals is still heavily brand related. Long tail searches are a relative minor piece to the equation. It was announced recently that Century 21 is running a Super Bowl ad on February 5th. Depending on when REN would be implemented how ironic would it be when Realty Executives announced to their agents that all their listings would be advertised during the Super Bowl. Pass the chips!

In a way MOVE, with the announcement of REN, has changed the conversation away from IDX (something they are very weak in) to Syndication (something they are very strong in).

“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle”
― Sun Tzu, The Art of War, Special Edition

Smart MOVE.

New York Real Group Forges Statewide Stats Partnership with 10K Research

“The New York State Association of REALTORS® (NYSAR) and 10K Research and Marketing are pleased to announce the February 2012 launch of a statewide housing market reporting partnership using combined data from Multiple Listing Services from throughout New York State.

10K will gather and organize housing sales data from the state’s array of 31 MLSs and provide unique, attractive and localized market reports to 33 participating local associations within NYSAR, making each group the definitive voice of real estate in their respective local markets.”

Two things I love about this. First thing; 10K is clearly doing well. It just shows you how great products combined with a awesome team can succeed (in any market). Secondly, 10K Research is part of the Minneapolis Association of REALTORS. You hear a lot about local associations struggling with generating new forms of revenue and business models. These associations should look look north.

I sent this post out to Vendor Alley Private Newsletters subscribers last week but thought it was worth a re-post today.

I’ve been reading a few interesting perspectives on listing syndication.

Here’s the first one:

‘Think Before You Syndicate’

Jon Colie, President of Champion Realty – Guest posting on MRIS‘ blog, REsource

If you think about it, a national aggregator selling agents leads off of a website becomes less about the quality of the listing database and far more about the quantity. More listings mean more “eye candy” thus more opportunities to sell agent placement.

Champion Realty is a HomeServices Company, natch!

And the second comes from a comment made on a Vendor Alley post about Brookfield acquiring Prudential:

Brad Blumberg, Smarter Agent

Am I the only one who finds it amazing that the entire real estate relo and franchisor business of Prudential just sold for $110 million, and Zillow Market Cap on that day was over $600 million. Has the value of the real estate purchase shifted to the aggregators at the expense of the value of real estate brokerage businesses. Think Edina realty, when they pulled listings from Trulia, was thinking about creating local value in their brand instead of adding value to the aggregators?

Smart!

Inman News’ list of the 100 Most Influential Leaders In Real Estate is out. For the 3rd year in a row I’ve made the list. You can check it out here:

http://www.inman.com/inman100/2011/greg-robertson

I started this blog in 2007 and am constantly amazed at the growth of its readership/traffic. Including the fact that in just one week I’m just about sold out of all advertising slots for the entire year of 2012.

I sincerely appreciate your support.

Thank you,

Greg

Here are some others you might recognize

Merri Jo Cowen
Russ Bergeron
Art Carter
Bob Bemis
Rebecca Jensen
Bob Hale
David Charron
Saul Klein
Matt Lerner
Mark Lesswing
Brian Larson
Gregg Larson
Errol Samuelson
Ian Morris

Rob Overman

Looks like Rob Overman is leaving LPS and heading to ShowingTime.  Rumors of this has been out there for a couple weeks.  I did happen to speak with Rob today and confirm the news about his new gig.  He has been working with the ShowingTime team for many years while at LPS, and always thought of them as talented guys.   In his current gig Rob is working remotely from home for LPS. Rob lives in a suburb of Chicago, where ShowingTime is located, and is now looking forward to working in an office with others.

ShowingTime sounds like a good match for him.  Rob was quick to point out that he enjoyed his time at LPS but was looking for a new challenge.  Good to see him stay in the industry.  Congrats!

Hard to believe that RealtyTrac co-founder, James Saccacio, has stepped down as CEO and now acts as a “executive advisor”. As I first reported some time ago (Inman News just posted something today) it looks like my sources were correct and a equity group from Texas has bought a majority interest in the company.

Full press release below:

RealtyTrac Secures Capital Investment from Renovo Capital, Positioning the Company for Continued Growth
Capital Infusion Enables RealtyTrac to Focus on Improving User Experience by Developing Innovative Products and Refining its Nationwide Foreclosure Data

IRVINE, Calif. – Nov. 28, 2011 — RealtyTrac® (www.realtytrac.com), the leading online marketplace for foreclosure properties, today announced that the company has obtained a substantial capital investment from Renovo Capital LLC through the private equity firm’s Renwood Opportunities Fund. Renovo’s investment in RealtyTrac provides the capital necessary to fund growth, nurture expansion into untapped areas of the market, and continue the company’s mission of dramatically improving the overall experience of transacting real estate.

Moving forward, RealtyTrac will focus on expanding its data collection capabilities and footprint while constantly improving the user experience on the nation’s leading foreclosure website, www.realtytrac.com, and developing innovative new products to enhance RealtyTrac’s value proposition for individuals, investors and real estate professionals.

Brandon Moore will assume the CEO role. Moore successfully led the expansion of several online ventures and has specific expertise in subscription-based marketing. He was most recently the senior vice president and general manager of One Technologies, where he was instrumental in growing the company’s annual revenue exponentially over a four-year span.
RealtyTrac’s co-founder, James J. Saccacio, will continue to help shape the company’s future as a member of the RealtyTrac board, and as an executive advisor and continuing to impart his trusted market knowledge as a spokesperson for the company.

“I am excited to move forward with this venture as it will empower RealtyTrac to better serve its customers, providing them with a wider data reach, more robust foreclosure search and real estate research capabilities, and an enhanced user experience,” said Saccacio. “With this capital infusion, RealtyTrac’s leadership can expand on its core competencies of collecting, analyzing and democratizing the availability of U.S. foreclosure data. We have identified just the right investor to partner with, and the timing of this investment is well synched with our plans for maintaining RealtyTrac’s reputation as a go-to company that exceeds the needs of its customer base and addresses the exciting challenges the dynamic real estate market presents.”
“We are pleased to complete this transaction and continue working with RealtyTrac’s management team to preserve and expand upon this widely respected brand,” said Renovo Managing Partner Mark Barbeau. “This company is a valuable resource to real estate professionals, investors and financial institutions alike, as well as for various organizations within the public sector.”

About RealtyTrac Inc. 

RealtyTrac (www.realtytrac.com) is the leading online marketplace of foreclosure properties, with more than 1.5 million default, auction and bank-owned listings from over 2,200 U.S. counties, along with detailed property, loan and home sales data. Hosting millions of unique monthly visitors, RealtyTrac provides innovative technology solutions and practical education resources to facilitate buying, selling and investing in real estate. RealtyTrac’s foreclosure data has also been used by the Federal Reserve, FBI, U.S. Senate Joint Economic Committee and Banking Committee, U.S. Treasury Department, and numerous state housing and banking departments to help evaluate foreclosure trends and address policy issues related to foreclosures.

About Renovo Capital LLC

Renovo Capital LLC (www.renovocapital.com), through its Renwood Opportunities Fund, invests in companies across a variety of industries in North America. Renwood Opportunities Fund was formed by Renovo Capital and Rosewood Private Investments, the private equity arm of The Rosewood Corporation, a prominent family-owned company with diverse worldwide operations and investments. Renovo Capital has offices in Dallas, Denver, and Irvine.

About James Saccacio

RealtyTrac Co-Founder James Saccacio became the company’s chairman and CEO in October 2000. Since then, he has transitioned the company from a local provider of foreclosure data to the nation’s leading online foreclosure marketplace. He was named one of the 100 most influential real estate leaders in 2010 by Inman News and received the 2011 Distinguished Alumni Award from the SMU Cox School of Business, for which he currently serves on the Executive Advisory Board. Saccacio is a sought-after industry expert on mortgage and foreclosure-related topics. His knowledge and opinions have been solicited by major national media outlets, government agencies, business associations and educational communities alike. He remains intimately tied to RealtyTrac’s mission: to dramatically improve the overall experience of transacting real estate for individuals, investors and real estate professionals by making the process easier, more affordable and less time-consuming.
 
###
Media Contacts:
Christine Stricker
 949.502.8300, ext. 268
 christine.stricker@realtytrac.com
Michelle Schneider 
949.502.8300, ext. 139
 michelle.schneider@realtytrac.com

At the NAR EXPO 2011 in Anaheim I had a chance to get a demo from Bill Fowler, from Solid Earth, of their new “Spring“, MLS system. Hope you enjoy.

Super excited about this news. Through the use of the Cloud CMA API program 7 MLS vendors now have deep integration with Cloud CMA and their respective MLS system. These include FBS’ flexmls, Rapattoni MLS, Dynaconnection’s connectMLS, RMLSweb, IRES MLS, Discover MLS and now Paragon!

Full press release below:

Cloud CMA now offers deep integration with the Paragon MLS system.

Allows seamless one-click access to all Cloud CMA reports

HUNTINGTON BEACH, Calif. – Nov. 11, 2011 – Web software company W&R Studios announced today a joint marketing agreement with LPS MLS Solutions and the completed integration of Cloud CMA with LPS’ Paragon MLS system.

Cloud CMA will now be available as an option to all Paragon subscribers and was recently launched with the Contra Costa Association of REALTORS®, Bay East Association of REALTORS® and East Bay Regional Data Inc., which combined serve more than 14,000 Paragon subscribers.

Cloud CMA is an online report generator and offers real estate professionals the ability to create custom comparative market analysis (CMA) reports, buyer tours, property reports and flyers. Paragon subscribers will have the option for “one-click” access to all Cloud CMA report sets.

“We love the way LPS’ Paragon team implemented the Cloud CMA integration,” said Greg Robertson, co-founder of W&R Studios. “Cloud CMA users can now generate great-looking reports in a matter of a few minutes.”

According to Glenn Christoph, MLS systems director for the Contra Costa and Bay East Association of REALTORS®, “Our users can create a variety of new reports using Cloud CMA. It’s also very easy for them to generate any report by just sending an email, even from their smartphones.”

“Cloud CMA offers a perfect solution for our customers looking for an enhanced CMA product with a lot of great, easy-to-use features that perfectly complement Paragon,” said Bob Morse, vice president of MLS Sales for LPS MLS Solutions.

About W&R Studios
Founded in 2008, W&R Studios is a privately held web software company located in Huntington Beach, California. W&R Studios focuses on creating the next generation of Web-based software solutions for the real estate industry. By providing a “less is more” approach to software design, elegant user interfaces, and using the latest in agile programming, W&R Studios’ software applications are at the same time powerful, yet accessible to everyone.

About Lender Processing Services (LPS)
Lender Processing Services, Inc. (LPS) is a leading provider of integrated technology, services and mortgage performance data and analytics to the mortgage and real estate industries. LPS offers solutions that span the mortgage continuum, including lead generation, origination, servicing, workflow automation (Desktop®), portfolio retention and default, augmented by the company’s award-winning customer support and professional services. Approximately 50 percent of all U.S. mortgages by dollar volume are serviced using LPS’ loan servicing platform, MSP. LPS also offers proprietary mortgage and real estate data and analytics for the mortgage and capital markets industries. For more information about LPS, visit www.lpsvcs.com.

# # #

For more information:

W&R Studios

Greg Robertson

714.240.3895

greg at wrstudios dot com

Lender Processing Services:

Michelle Kersch

904.854.5043

Michelle.Kersch at lpsvcs dot com

SOURCE: Lightning | Twice – The official blog of W&R Studios

It’s just about the time of year when you start reading “top 10″ lists of 2011. I thought I would start a new tradition here at Vendor Alley and rattle off my choices for top companies and people in the real estate industry for 2011.

I call them “The Vendys”.

1. The “Bob Hale” Award
The reason I call this the “Bob Hale” award is that it seems Bob is listed every year as one of the top influencer/innovators in the industry. So think of it as “besides Bob”, who really made a difference this year in the real estate industry. : )

And the winner is….Merri Jo Cowen

I’ve been a part of CMLS for many, many years and while other board presidents have set the stage for CMLS to take a larger role in the MLS community Merri Jo has been the catalyst to make those goals happen. It’s been a pleasure to have a front row seat to how CMLS has changed over the years and Merri Jo has been a huge part of that success.

2. Best new real estate technology/product. -Nest
What happens with the inventor of the iPod focuses his attention on real estate? Magic.

Runner up- I have to say that I really love Realtor.com’s iPad app.

3. Top MLS Provider. – MRED, LLC
All you need to do is take a look at the pressroom of MRED, LLC to see the transformation happening at MRED.

4. Top MLS Vendor – TIED: LPS and CoreLogic.
My basis for this was the CIVIX lawsuit. While I believe NAR painted themselves in to a corner with the settlement it was these two MLS vendors who stepped up and wrote the really big checks.

5. Top Real Estate Portal – Zillow
Their spectacular IPO and recent acquisition of Diverse Solutions only shows they are here to stay and poised to dominate.

6. Best new real estate vendor. – Goomzee
I’ve had many discussions with their CEO, Mike Sparr, and he is one of the new players that “gets it”.

7. Top company to watch – RED -Real Estate Digital
After a bold management buy-out, these guys are just getting started.

8. Most improved company – Inman News
The conferences are better, their site is better, Agent Reboot, InmanNext, the list goes on and on. Tim, Alice, Chris, and Katie and the rest of the team has done a spectacular job and can’t wait to see what’s next.

9. Best industry blog – 1000watt Blog
If I can’t pick VendorAlley.com then 1000watt Consulting gets my vote. Brian, Marc and Joel, offer equal doses of spot on analysis and inspiration all wrapped up in a beautifully atheistic and great writing.

10 Best company blog – RPR
While I have been known to poke some fun at these guys you can’t argue what a great job they do with their blog. One small quibble, I can’t view videos on my iPad.

11. Top MLS Provider CEO – Art Carter
Art Carter turned the fiasco that was California Association of REALTORS failed state-wide MLS effort (calREDD) into in the the largest MLS in country. I don’t think he’s done yet.

12. Best Industry Conference. – CMLS
Like with all my picks I’m a little biased but CMLS’ annual conference keeps getting bigger and better.

13. Best Real Estate Franchise – Keller Williams.
Sure their consumer facing website sucks but in the world of real estate franchisors its all about agent count and these guys are winning.

Well that’s it. Am I a “kiss ass”, “spot on”, “not even close”? What say you?