Reunited in Vegas
Back to the future baby! I will be co-moderating the Tech & Data Track at Inman Connect Las Vegas this year with none other than Zillow’s greatest acquisition, Katie Smithson.
So join us for the content, stay for all the inside jokes and if you have any topics you like us to us cover DM either of us.
“Many people were hung up on the name ‘Buyside’ when in fact we are much more – we are the top seller lead generation tool for real estate,” says Chief Executive Charles J. Williams IV. “The new brand allows us to expand into new markets like mortgage, bringing purchase loan opportunities to originators.”
I like the story behind the new name and $10 million dollars is legit. Congrats to everyone at Buyside.
MLSListings Pioneers RESO’s Universal Property Identifier
“One of the best stories to emerge from RESO’s recent 2022 Spring Conference was how MLSListings, based in the heart of Silicon Valley, stepped to the forefront in implementing the RESO Universal Property Identifier (UPI) standard into its multiple listing service (MLS) system.
According to Olga Ermolin, Director of Engineering at MLSListings, “We were determined to do something beyond a simple proof of concept, intentionally implementing the UPI into full production to solve real issues right now, such as delivering thorough property history to our subscribers.”
To see any progress, in any endeavor, there has to be a first. Congrats to Olga and Joel.
On this week’s episode of Industry Relations Greg and Rob welcome Sam DeBord, CEO of RESO, to the show as they dig deep into data standards and why Sam needs an axe! The guys talk about how to survive week-long conferences as it is officially convention season in America. They talk with Sam about MLS, Web API, RESO, brokers and vendors, and much more! Watch us on YouTube or listen on your favorite podcast player or just click below.
Genius? Not so much
A few people have been asking me about a new product called homegenius. Homegenius claims to “transcend the CMA”. And help agents cut the time of making an average CMA from 30 mins to 5 mins. Sounds great right?
So I went to their website to watch a webinar they made as part of an Inman News series. The presenter pulled up a property using homegenius. The property he pulled up was in Tampa (no idea how they are getting the MLS data). The homegenius price it came back with was $476,726. Just for shits and giggles I paused the video and went to Redfin to see if the property was recently sold.
It did sell recently, for $607,000. 🤦♂️
I never went back and watched the rest of the video.
The thing is this…sometimes it takes 30 mins to make a CMA, because in this market that’s the amount of time it takes to make a good CMA. It doesn’t take a genius to figure that out.
On this week’s episode of Industry Relations, Greg is back home from the T3 Conference and tells Rob what he heard. The event was fantastic with many thought-provoking interviews. The duo also discusses the importance of companies having a “prepper” mindset for taking big risks in the world of proptech. Watch us on YouTube or listen below.
REX closes brokerage, hires David Boies in Zillow lawsuit
“An email sent by Steve Dawson, REX’s chief compliance officer, to the company’s salaried agents Thursday afternoon read: “Starting immediately, please transfer your license over to a new brokerage of your choice. This needs to be completed by day’s end tomorrow.” The note bolded “day’s end.”
Nice scoop from Real Trends. Boies‘ latest clients include Theranos, Harvey Weinstein, and accusers against Jeffery Epstein.
REXIT?
Has REX Homes finally ceased operations?
“Numerous staff reached out to us directly to indicate the company’s last day was Tuesdayand that a companywide call on Friday outlined the end of REX Homes. While the entity of the brokerage still exists, we are told there are no longer offices, staff, leadership, or agents.
Staff at the Austin, TX and Woodland Hills, CA offices (both in Texas) have confirmed that as of today, the doors are literally closed. It is unclear what REX’s plans are for wrapping up any current contracts that haven’t closed.”
As litigious as REX has been in the past something tells me this story is far from over.
Looking for a new gig?
MLS Integration Specialist – Lone Wolf
“We are looking for a tech-savvy individual who is self-motivated, can work on their own or within a team and is passionate about their work to join our MLS Integration team working on our Transaction Desk product. You’ll work on a small team with a large impact to our customers. The team is responsible for connecting data and programming forms that are used across hundreds of MLSs to make doing business easier for brokerages and agents.”
The find out about this job or post a job, please visit the Vendor Alley Job Board.
State and local associations now provide zipForm as a member benefit to over 665,000 members
Over 665,000 real estate agents in the U.S. get Lone Wolf Transactions as a member benefit
“These incredible associations have stepped up and are supporting their members at a crucial time,” said Lisa Mihelcich, GM of Associations at Lone Wolf. “We’re moving into a post-pandemic world and digital real estate transactions are more important than ever. Transactions is the top transaction management solution in the country, and the only one that can provide a complete and modern real estate experience for agents, brokers, buyers, and sellers. In that way, it’s not only a critical tool for real estate professionals, but for real estate as a whole.”
Great job by Lisa and her team at Lone Wolf and these state and local association leaders. This number is still growing. I think that number will get close to 1 million with the addition of new associations and with the option of a new bundle. As Victor Lund pointed out in a recent WAV Group blog post; Lone Wolf Provides Agent Business Bundle for $199 per year
“This bundle contains the LionDesk CRM – another company acquired by Lone Wolf—as well as the built-in eSignature solution, zipLogix Digital Ink (powered by Authentisign). It is a lot of software for a pretty low price:
-Transaction Management
-Forms Management
-Unlimited Document Storage
-eSignatures
-CRM
Lone Wolf has just recently completed integration work where you can run an ad with Boost, where leads will flow into Lion Desk. Then that lead information is sent to create a Cloud CMA, which can then kick off a listing agreement, and then a purchase agreement in zipForm or TransactionDesk. That property information can be uploaded to create a partial listing on the MLS. After the purchase is complete the agent can order a Home Warranty and then the transaction information is captured by Lone Wolf Back Office so the broker can issue a commission check to the agent. End to end baby.
The dream has always been to reduce or stop double/triple/quadruple entry of data. Lone Wolf customers can live in that world today.
