LanCo RE Weblog

Late yesterday afternoon, the National Association of REALTORS® (NAR) announced that on November 12, they will unveil a new web site called HouseLogic designed to provide home owners with a smart, simple resource to help them manage their homes wisely and to help REALTORS® extend their relationship with consumers through the entire lifecycle of homeownership.  While the specifics are still sketchy at this point, it is clear that NAR’s latest foray into the world of online real estate is not just a simple blip on the radar screen but rather a major trembler within our industry.

For the past couple of years, NAR has been working on a project called the ‘Realtors Property Resource’ (RPR) that has been shrouded in secrecy.  In fact, even the name was a mystery.  It had been called ’Gateway,’ ‘The Real Estate Channel’ and the ‘Library/Archive.’  Those of us in the industry weren’t even allowed to know all the details about the project.  Was it for consumers?  REALTORS®?  Would it provide data on every property in the US?  Was it designed to be a property valuation tool?  Would it take the place of REALTOR.com?  Or, dare I ask – - – Was it intended to be a national multiple listing service?  It was like throwing darts from 50 yards to try and hit an ant – who knew?

Well, the picture is starting to come into focus.  NAR has purchased the technology assets of Cyberhomes, a leading real estate resource web site, along with Lender Processing Services (LPS), the nation’s leading provider of mortgage processing services and settlement services, to feed parcel information into NAR’s RPR database.  It will aggregate this data, including public records, foreclosure data, default stats, interactive charts, community information and a social function in one place.  It will be a REALTOR®-only database.  Think property data on steroids!  The idea is to keep agents and brokers at the center of the real estate transaction.

Another facet of the RPR is a tool tentatively called the ‘REALTOR® Valuation Model’ (RVM).  This would be the REALTOR® version of Zillow’s Zestimates (read my post about it).  The tool would assist in establishing a more accurate property value than the Zestimate.  The missing link though is MLS data.  And therein lies the key to RPR.

If the RPR is going to work, it will need MLS property data.  Not some of it or half of it – - – all of it.  Right now, REALTORS® from across the country pay fees to their local MLS’s to have access to this property information.  If RPR has access to this data and repackages it with all these fancy bells and whistles that enhance property data and then turns around and charges its’ members for it (either through increased dues or a pay-as-you-go model), there will be more than a few unhappy real estate practitioners.  In their minds, they won’t want to pay for two sets of MLS data.  On the other side of the coin, there are those in the industry that would welcome it if some entity would upset the MLS cart and created a national depository for property data.  Personally, I’m on the national side of the argument here but getting 900 MLS’s to agree to get onboard and cede their respective local influences will be a feat of epic proportions.

I love the fact that NAR is pushing the envelope of what some in the industry thinks is impossible – - – a National MLS.  But even if it fails, the staid walls of ‘business as usual’ within our industry will forever be changed.  It’s just not clear yet what that change will be.  Stay tuned.

Related articles of interest:

• Getting Serious About Your House and the Market (nytimes.com)
• Strong rebound seen for home sales (seattletimes.nwsource.com)
• Sites that get your home ready to sell (news.cnet.com)
• The Nation’s Top 10 Most Searched Homes (abcnews.go.com)