“Today Chris Bennett and Amy Gorce announced the launch of PRESTA Team, a new company that will leverage their combined 60+ years of industry experience to provide consulting and advisory services in the real estate space. Throughout their careers, Chris and Amy have accumulated valuable insight into many aspects of organized real estate and aim to assist MLSs, Brokers, and Proptech companies strategically navigate through times of unprecedented competition and change.
PRESTA is an acronym, “Premier Real Estate Solutions and Technology Advisors“. There was certainly a hole left by ClareityConsulting when CoreLogic acquired them back in 2017. T3Sixty have been quick to try and fill the vacuum as well as WAV Group. I respect both Chris and Amy and know the industry will be a better place with their insights. I’m sure they are both nervous and excited about their new adventure and I can’t help but feel a little bit jealous of starting something new.
My best wishes to Chris and Amy, looking forward to seeing you both soon!
“Cambridge, ON and Dallas, TX – July 7, 2021 – Lone Wolf Technologies (“Lone Wolf”) and Minnesota Realtors® are pleased to announce a new agreement that brings real estate’s leading transaction management solutions, Lone Wolf Transactions (zipForm Edition) and Lone Wolf Transactions (TransactionDesk Edition), to the association’s 22,000 members as member benefits in 2022. The new agreement starts in September 2021.
“We’re happy to partner with Lone Wolf in providing digital form and transaction management tools to our members,” said Chris Gellar, CEO of Minnesota Realtors®. “These solutions put functionality and freedom of choice in our members’ hands and lets them spend more time servicing the needs of their clients.”
This is following a recent announcement that the California Association of REALTORS and the Texas Association of REALTORS (LOI) have also chosen to provide Lone Wolf’s Transaction Management Solutions as a free member benefit.
2021 RESO Executive Board: Chair: Rebecca Jensen, President and CEO, Midwest Real Estate Data, LLC (MRED) – re-elected Vice-Chair: Michael Wurzer, President and CEO, FBS, Creators of Flexmls – re-elected Secretary: Katie Smithson, Director of Enterprise Services, W+R Studios, a Lone Wolf Company – elected Treasurer: Richard Renton, CEO, Triad MLS – re-elected
Representing Technology Companies, Developers, Partners & Consultants with Revenue Over $25 Million: Scott Woodard, CEO, ShowingTime – elected Lucie Fortier, Executive Leader, Product Management, CoreLogic – appointed Turan Tekin, Director, MLS and Industry Development, Zillow Group – appointed
Representing Multiple Listing Services and REALTOR® Associations with Less Than 50,000 Subscribers: John Breault, Vice President of MLS and Member Services, Rhode Island Association of REALTORS® & State-Wide MLS, Inc. – elected Chris Carrillo, CEO, Metro MLS (Incumbent) – elected
Representing Class D, Real Estate Brokerages, Brokers, Agents & Appraisers: Bill Fowler, Senior Director of Industry Relations, Compass – elected Dan Troup, Director of Data Strategy & Operations, RE/MAX & Seventy3, LLC (Incumbent) – elected
RESO Board Advisors: Bob Evans – VP Industry Relations, Move.com Liz Tewksbury – Director of MLS Operations, Homesnap
Congratulations Katie Smithson and the rest of the RESO officers and directors. ????
With NWLAR, there are 15 diverse REALTOR Association Shareholders in the NTREIS family. The regional MLS contracts with vendors for services and wholesales to the Shareholders who provide direct services to their membership.
John Holley, CEO of NTREIS added, “Our decentralized model is attractive to Associations that wish to provide a high level of REALTOR services to their membership but have another entity to do the heavy lifting of the technology and data services of a multiple listing service.”
Makes sense. Fits NTREIS’ model, plus NWLAR members get to take advantage of NTREIS deep member services. These cross-state consolidations are becoming more common.
“In his nearly nine years with NNRMLS, Pickard has proven himself to be a leader. He’s played a crucial role in strategic planning, executive decision-making, data analysis, budgeting, negotiating, contracting, recruiting, project management, business development, policy, public speaking, marketing, and communications. Pickard is a driving force behind the implementation of the NNRMLS strategic vision, empowering team members and contractors, coordinating solutions with vendors and stakeholders, and fostering strong relationships with NNRMLS’ Shareholders to deliver world-class MLS services to our members.”
George Pickard
This isn’t the first time NNRMLS has promoted from within, Shelley Specchio (now CEO of MIBOR) was also promoted when Merri Jo Cowen left for the top spot at Stellar MLS (formerly My Florida Regional MLS).
Great gig for George. As mentioned above NNRMLS is known for being a creator of leaders in the industry.
“W+R Studios, whose flagship product is comparative market analysis software Cloud CMA, fielded the survey “2020 Survey of Best Practices for CMAs and Listing Presentations” online from May 18 to May 31. The company sent the survey to its 298,520 Cloud CMA agent and broker subscribers, of which 3,325 completed the survey. Survey respondents hail from 46 states nationwide.
“Any agent creating a comparative market analysis wonders whether they are ‘doing it right’ or is curious about what other agents include or don’t include in their CMA. This survey gives agents an inside peek at the best practices of what goes into creating a winning CMA,” said Frances Wiseman, director of marketing for W+R Studios, in a statement.”
I was also surprised that most agents were not including Zestimates in their CMAs. Less so about iBuyer offers, since the number of iBuyer markets is still limited.
“A powerful data component that is affirmed by the report is that agents interrogate all listing statuses in their CMA. Active listings are important to understand what is available to buyers today, but pricing is particularly influenced by pending, sold, expired, and withdrawn listings. The CMA may be one of the reasons why homes are selling so much faster (lower days on market) than ever before. It is hard for a listing to hide when the listing price is too high. Surprisingly, the report indicates that the properties included in a CMA range from 5 to 11. Agents focus on the Days on Market Comparison more than 61% of the time, making it one of the most vital calculations in the CMA report.”
Yup, Days on Market (DOM) is a huge deal for agents. Which I know is a battle at most MLS organizations.
Check out the full results here. If you are at an MLS organization this would be a perfect thing to share, since a lot of agents wonder whether they are doing a CMA “right”.
I would love to hear any suggestions to make the report better for next year. Are there any questions you want to ask? Let me know.
“Gene comes to REcolorado with more than 30 years of real estate experience. Before transitioning to MLS executive, he served in the roles of agent, broker-owner, and MLS Board of Director. Currently, Gene is the CEO of the Northern Nevada Regional MLS (NNRMLS) where his focus has been on guiding the success of the organizations members by providing a variety of products and services that create an efficient and successful marketplace. Prior to leading NNRMLS, Gene served on the Board of Directors for TREND and was Chairman from 2013-2016. He also served on the MAPS Task Force/Vision Team/MLS Evolved to successfully form Bright MLS and was Vice Chair of the Bright Board of Directors.”
I interviewed Gene about a year ago on my podcast Listing Bits almost exactly a year ago. Northern Nevada Regional MLS (NNRMLS) furthers its reputation as being a fountainhead of MLS talent in the industry. Congratulations to Gene and REColorado.
“VESTAPLUS™, the newest MLS system to enter the MLS industry and serving over 20,000 REALTORS® to date, inked a deal to bring back their software to the members of the Palm Springs Regional Association of REALTORS® (PSRAR) due to strong demand from PSRAR subscribers. The MLS™/CLAW a luxury MLS services provider in Beverly Hills and Malibu is the provider of VESTAPLUS™. The VESTAPLUS™ software will be delivered via a 3-way agreement between the Palm Springs Regional Association of REALTORS®, The MLS™/CLAW and California Regional MLS (CRMLS)”
With CRMLS latest expansion it looks like they have 4 MLS System of Choices: VESTAPLUS, Matrix, Paragon, and FlexMLS. It’s good to be an MLS Vendor these days.
“The HW Vanguard Award recognizes leaders of businesses contributing to the growth of the housing economy and its various sectors, including mortgage, fintech and real estate. And this year’s winners distinguished themselves as some of the top leaders innovating the housing industry today.”
HousingWire
Lots of great people on this list including Chris Heller, now of OJO Labs, Pat Stone of WFG, and Drew Uher of HomeLight. Congrats to Ernie and the rest.
The new CREA WEBForms® will be powered by Lone Wolf’s TransactionDesk®, an industry-leading document and transaction management system. The new CREA WEBForms® includes unlimited document storage, forms, MLS® integration and agent-level transaction management.
“Our members’ business needs have changed since the creation of CREA WEBForms® and they continue to evolve,” stated Michael Bourque, CREA’s CEO. “CREA WEBForms® needs to adapt to changing needs in a timely fashion, integrate with board and association MLS® Systems and other third-party tools used by members across the country.”
If I’m reading this right it sounds like Lone Wolf just site licensed a whole country. Nice work!
