KW, AGNT, HomeServices of America, Real, and RE/MAX Fight Private Listings With New Collaboration
“This effort is bigger than any one company.”
Keller Williams, AGNT (eXp and NextHome), HomeServices of America, Real, and RE/MAX launched Open Real Estate today, with Brown Harris Stevens, Lamacchia, Samson, and Windermere signed on as participating members.
One thing I love is that they dropped the news right before Compass’ annual retreat. Now Reffkin will be on stage trying to defend his bullshit “Seller’s Choice” narrative against a backdrop of multiple lawsuits, inquiries from local, state, and national politicians, and some of the largest real estate firms in the business advocating for transparency and consumers. And some Compass agents are already losing faith. Who wants all this drama?
Okay, back to the announcement. After reading a bunch and watching this video, here’s what I’ve come up with.
The idea (not the execution) is simple. A broker enters a listing once, using standard fields, and it goes to every member brokerage, the local MLS, portals, appraisers, and data services. The listing has to be in the database within one business day of the listing agreement being signed. The listing broker then picks “Market,” which is public, or “Participant,” which only agents at member brokerages can see and nobody can market publicly.
A submission deadline, and every member sees every listing. That’s a cooperation rule. This time, the brokers wrote it.
Here are some high-level takeaways:
- Open Real Estate is pushing back against the industry’s move toward inventory fragmentation and worries we’re heading toward a European model.
- Open Real Estate has lost confidence that the MLS industry is going to solve this problem. This may be due to some MLS organizations bending the knee to Compass or the onslaught of lawsuits. (Sprinkle in some resentment about paying hundreds of millions of dollars in settlements following the NAR litigation.)
- Open Real Estate is tired of dealing with so many MLS organizations and outdated technology.
- Open Real Estate believes listing data is worth more than what brokers are currently being compensated for, and it plans to “democratize” the sharing of any revenues generated with Open Real Estate participants.
- Open Real Estate doesn’t want to be a consumer-facing portal.
- There’s no cost to sign up.
- RFPs are out. They want to use “third-party, best-in-class technology.”
- The plan is to be operational in Q1 2027.
- Open Real Estate is ready to make “massive investments.”
I can see why they’re doing it. Brokers are running on razor-thin margins and looking for ways to replace lost commission revenue. Several of these firms wrote big checks to settle the commission lawsuits after NAR lost Sitzer-Burnett. And all of them have spent years dealing with hundreds of MLSs, each with its own rules, fields, and fees.
If your listings are your most valuable asset, building your own pipe and getting paid for what flows through it makes business sense. Who could blame them? Although it’s not that easy.
From what I understand, you need a complete dataset for anyone to be truly interested. Not 25%, not 50%, not 75%. And these firms aren’t there.
As I’ve stated, I don’t think these firms were particularly happy with how some MLS organizations bent the knee to Compass. But I do see something that might help many MLSs.
Since the settlement, NAR has been “de-risking,” pushing MLS policy decisions down to local MLSs. That leaves a lot of MLS executives defending rules on their own. A national group of big brokers with its own cooperation standard might be just the ticket for MLSs tired of making up excuses.
I could see Open Real Estate starting to charge MLSs for listing data, and not every MLS will be able to pay. The big ones will. The smaller ones might not, and that could set off another round of consolidation.
But running a broker cooperative is hard. Ask any MLS executive.
Rules need enforcement, enforcement needs staff and governance, and at some point, somebody has to fine a member’s top producer.
Open Real Estate has no leadership, no staff, and no final governance structure yet. It hasn’t picked a technology partner, and the RFP process with “several national technology vendors” wraps up in Q1 2027.
I think declaring they’ll be “operational” by Q1 2027 is a mistake. And I’m not really talking about the tech.
It’s never the tech. It’s the politics.
What about BLX? I thought KW and HomeServices had already announced something tech-wise with Cotality. This all sounds very familiar.
Here’s a quote from Kevin Greene, general manager of Real Estate Solutions at Cotality, in RISMedia on July 10, 2026:
“The MLS remains the essential bedrock of the local real estate marketplace. It is the definitive environment for compilation and broker-to-broker cooperation,” Greene states. “BLX is not a replacement marketplace; it is a broker’s private portfolio management tool. The two systems work in unison. The broker gains deep visibility into their own internal business inventory across their regional or national footprint, while the MLS continues to provide the comprehensive, hyperlocal market intelligence that every agent needs to advise clients and close transactions.”
Will Open Real Estate sync both ways the way BLX does? Leo says yes in the BAM video.
Again, I’m skeptical.
And what about Compass?
Back in February Robert Reffkin floated a national listing platform jointly owned by a coalition of brokerages, with “no disproportionate ownership” by Compass and an independent board.
Today, his biggest competitors launched something that looks a lot like it.
He just isn’t on the cap table.
On paper, Open Real Estate runs straight at his exclusive-listing strategy: Get it in within a day, and every member sees it.
But that strategy has brought Compass plenty of headaches and lawsuits. If Reffkin is looking for a way out, could a broker-run cooperative that isn’t an MLS be it?
Joining means playing by his rivals’ rules. Staying out means fighting them on another front.
Lots for him to think about.
Right now, it’s a letter, a website, and eight logos. It’s an interesting idea with a lot of hard parts left.
By Q1 2027, we’ll know whether it’s a platform or a press release.
This is a quite logical idea. The idea is fully baked. They need an implementor to spear head the tech evaluation and implementation. I hope they succeed!!