patrick.net

Interesting that you put up this post at the same time you are trying to monetize your site. Monetization is the problem all web based business has.

The local MLS is funded by membership.

The MLS does a better job of keeping the data together than Trulia, or Zillow. redfin gets it's feed directly from the Multiples because they are brokers.

Zillow has the best chance to be a National Real Estate data base, but that seems years, or decades off.

Bottom line is that it is all about the money. Who will pay for the data collection and retention if not the agents, or brokerages?

I think there is a social answer to that. No one has to pay for data collection if enough people have an interest in entering it.

David Losh says

Bottom line is that it is all about the money. Who will pay for the data collection and retention if not the agents, or brokerages?

Are you kidding? You think the MLS is a better service than what a more objective operator could provide? The problem is that the MLS and it's Realtors have a near monolopy, and they use it to obscure and manipulate the data to their own benefit.

Got a good laugh on the part in the video where he blames Zillow for the sluggish housing market.

The MLS can't manipulate data because all the data will get manipulated in the same way. If you've never looked at it, you might get "manipulated" but beyond that, it's open to everyone to view.

I have also seen markets where there is no MLS and it's a complete and utter mess. With people getting ripped off everywhere because they can't get good information. Like any data, unless you study it for awhile, you're going to be tricked by it. Any realtor with any experience can read the data properly. If they're lying to you, better data isn't going to help that, they're just going to find a new way to lie to you. If they're not trustworthy people to start with, they're not going to ever be trustworthy.

Binders full of houses!!

Papercut says

You think the MLS is a better service

Absolutely the Multiple Listing Service is the only game in town.

Find any source of data that isn't driven by dollars. You see the same thing in medicine, areo space, automotive, even political; if there is no source of funding for the data it doesn't get collected, stored, or distributed.

People won't enter correct data, there will be no over sight, there won't be any standards.

Everybody wants to "fix" the Real Estate industry, but no one wants to do the work, more importantly no one wants to pay for it.

David Losh says

Papercut says

You think the MLS is a better service

Absolutely the Multiple Listing Service is the only game in town.

Find any source of data that isn't driven by dollars. You see the same thing in medicine, areo space, automotive, even political; if there is no source of funding for the data it doesn't get collected, stored, or distributed.

People won't enter correct data, there will be no over sight, there won't be any standards.

Everybody wants to "fix" the Real Estate industry, but no one wants to do the work, more importantly no one wants to pay for it.

I agree, intrinsic motivation to do stuff just for love is a pure myth.

Anyone ever see the private info(for agents only) on MLS listings?
Agents cannot give you a printout of this info.

Also the MLS pretends FSBO's don't exist. It allows you to search in public records when doing a CMA but that's it. Most Realtors don't even know how to include these sales in their CMA's anyway.

"The local real estate board will no doubt continue to exist, but the MLS as we've known it is already on its way out, just like the three-ring binders that came before it. "

Total nonsense. I teach Realtors to use the MLS so I'm aware of every feature. The MLS that Realtors use versus these crap public sites, there's no comparison. The person who wrote this article probably never even logged onto the "real" MLS.

What I see is more and more people becoming licensed just so they can access a proper MLS system. The boards and the states may even figure out this trend and make it even easier to obtain licensing and ultimate access. I see this happening in Florida. The state test now has it so you can take the test as many times as you want (in a year) if you fail and it only costs $35 to retake it.

Right David Losh ..

We can all trust the National Association of Rodents , and their monopoly of data.
After all , who better than they to falsify national sales figure for years in a row, causing hundreds of thousands to make the worst financial decisions of their lives.

Keep singin' David ... we all need a laugh

"It's time to play the music
It's time to light the lights
It's time to meet the muppets
On the the muppet show tonight
It's time to put on makeup
It's time to dress up right
It's time to raise the curtain
On the muppet show tonight"

David Losh says

Interesting that you put up this post at the same time you are trying to monetize your site.

He was going to post it before he was trying to Monetize this site, but was hindered do to the fact the article wasn't written yet. The story was written in November 2012, I don't think there's any intent on Patrick's part in what stories he posts on his website. Pretty much anything related to housing is fair game. weather he agrees with the stories author or not.

I think there is a social answer to that. No one has to pay for data collection if enough people have an interest in entering it.

Sellers could enter the data, they are after all the ones with the motivation in a sale. A simple disclaimer that states you could be sued for entering false information would keep the data pretty accurate. I've seen some piss poor MLS listings, when the agent entering the information does a poor job at it, not to mention the photos they post.

Papercut says

The problem is that the MLS and it's Realtors have a near monolopy, and they use it to obscure and manipulate the data to their own benefit.

This is why they keep restating there sales figures for each month. They report one sale figure for the month of October, and when a someone like a newspaper checks there "facts" against the information available from public records from the townships, its oh we made a mistake, the sales were really this amount. Seriously I don't know why any news source with any creditably bothers to publish anything from the "National Association of Realtors" says.

David Losh says

The MLS does a better job of keeping the data together than Trulia, or Zillow.

BULL CRAP!

Every listing I was forwarded by Realtors,(before I took matters in my own hand to find a house by Internet sites.) either had a contract on them already. Or were NOT to spec I had requested. Either more ran down and in a bad neighborhood, or were priced way out my league.
MLS is a marketing tool, Realtors use to wear the enthusiasm of would be buyers down, and resign them from the notion that they will find a house to their specs at a reasonable price.

Furthermore, after I quit consulting Realtors, I still had realtors emailing me MLS. Every house I was even remotely interested in, I had already seen weeks before on either... Craigslist, Zillow, Ziprealty, Trulia or Realtor.com.
MLS is totally useless.

pkennedy says

The MLS can't manipulate data because all the data will get manipulated in the same way. If you've never looked at it, you might get "manipulated" but beyond that, it's open to everyone to view.

Er huh? So I can type in MLS website and pull up all the listings on the MLS? Oh wait, I'm NOT a realtor, so I can't even access it. Nice public transparency.

Lets ignore the fact that houses that been on the market for six months that are re-listed get a new MLS number and WOW look, its new on the market, better rush to get this one, it's hot. Lets look at why they re-instated there sales figures for the last 5 years.

http://www.gotoby.com/news/nar_answers_questions_about_restated_home_sales.htm

If you look at the website, The first question is why where the sales figures re-benchmarked down?

They claim a comparison of there data and court house deed transfers. If there data was correct to begin with, why would there be a difference.

I believe the only way to make the market look better today is to make the market look worse in the past. This way you can claim the poor home sales today are actually pretty good and getting better. Better run out and BUY now before prices increase to unaffordable levels.

Next they are claiming there sales figures are off because houses sold by "For Sale By Owners" are not included in there sales figures. This makes sense I will admit, but so long as those numbers benefited the NAR's rosey picture the market is hot, better go out and buy now, they were ignored. It's only after they need a way to make the market today to appear better than those figures are even considered.

OK, how about this as a business model:

* buyers enter the zip code, br, and price they are interested in, along with a blurb
* sellers enter the zip code, br, and price they want to sell at, along with a blurb and photo of the house

So you get two columns, sellers on the left and buyers on the right, for each zip code. Searching by zip, br, and price would be really easy.

Buyer and sellers then privately chat on Patrick.net to see if they are interested in talking more about an FSBO sale -- without any realtors being involved. The private chat gets around the problem that people don't like to talk about such things in public. And I could recommend flat-fee appraisers, inspectors, and lawyers to do the deal, though I don't think I could legally get referral fees from them.

If I get enough people using it (a few thousand), eventually I could charge $5/month for listings and that would be plenty to support the site.

From experience though, I think it will be hard to get sellers to list on Patrick.net. What would encourage them? Not paying any realtor commission would seem to be a motive, but realtors are expert at inducing fear.

Maybe I could also automatically distribute the seller's listing to Craigslist and other sites for them as a free service to help draw sellers in.

CaptainShuddup says

BULL CRAP!

Trulia, and Zillow are lagging the Multiple except in For Sale by Owners. You can always work directly with a seller.

The Multiple is a membership group. They own, and control the data. It's not a public forum until it hits a site like redfin, Trulia, or Zillow.

What every one objects to is the Real Estate agents who go out every frigging day and look for properties for sale. These people are listing agents. They will always know more than any one else about what is going on in the market place.

You see listing agents at open houses, but you never think that these people know what's going on. People avoid talking with agents who may have inside information.

I'm talking about the real workers in the Real Estate industry, the ones who have twenty or thirty listings in your area.

The people who work in Real Estate are professionals, and interact in a professional manner. For them there is always more than enough business.

So with, or without the Multiple Listing Service there are people who work in your area finding properties for sale, and finding buyers for them.

realtors are expert at inducing fear.

The word is exposure to the largest buyer pool. You would have a limited amount of buyers looking at your site on any given day. Buyers also want to see everything, so you would be offering a limited service.

From experience though, I think it will be hard to get sellers to list on Patrick.net. What would encourage them? Not paying any realtor commission would seem to be a motive, but realtors are expert at inducing fear.

A. The website would have to be called something other than Patrick.net, something a little more catchy.

B. The service would have to be free. At least for the first couple of years. Once the website builds up a sufficient following, then you can transition into a premium website that charges money.

In short an investment in time and money is required with no guarantee of a return on your investment. The internet is littered with failed websites everything from Auctions and job listing sites to porn and social media.

CaptainShuddup says

I was the local leading authority on every home with in a ten mile radius.

Bull Crap!

How many times did you get out of the car to knock a door of a property that may have been ready to come on the market? How many sellers did you call who might be interested in selling?
How many sellers called you asking for your advise about selling? Did you publish articles on forums about your expertise about your are? Where you marketing yourself as an area expert?

All those annoying things that Real Estate weasels do add up to market exposure you have no incentive to have. There again no seller has an incentive to talk to only you, except saving that commission, but will the next person pay more than you're willing to?

You're just guessing because you did it your way, right, or wrong.

Let's put it to a vote about a buyer, anyone out there, who would like a public forum of your home buying process.

You, the buyer, agree to have your home buying experience chronicled on Patrick.net, in real time, while it's happening.

You could get advice, and maybe people would submit For Sale by Owners to you.

You can make up a persona, and keep the addresses secret, but your daily experiences would be put into a forum.

David Losh says

How many times did you get out of the car to knock a door of a property that may have been ready to come on the market? How many sellers did you call who might be interested in selling?
How many sellers called you asking for your advise about selling? Did you publish articles on forums about your expertise about your are? Where you marketing yourself as an area expert?

I think the more accurate question would be,
"How many times did a Realtor actually contact the owner of the houses, I mentioned I was interested in?"

The answer would be probably none. They all had their own agenda to pawn off on me. A list of houses they all had, with the highest profit margins on them.

Every house I was interested in, that I told a realtor to inquire for me. Always came back and told me, they already had contracts on them. This was in a three year window that I was home shopping.
Most everyone of those houses were still either vacant and abandoned, or still had a for sale sign out front long after I found my house.

David Losh says

You, the buyer, agree to have your home buying experience chronicled on Patrick.net, in real time, while it's happening.

You could get advice, and maybe people would submit For Sale by Owners to you.

You can make up a persona, and keep the addresses secret, but your daily experiences would be put into a forum.

OK, I proposed it, here:

http://patrick.net/?p=1219707

I'll make sure it goes out in the email tonight.

There were plenty of home buying experiences chronicled on Patnet.
I can't recall one positive realtor experience though.
Bernie from Week end at Bernie's would be a great Realtor.
That's all you need is a guy with the lics.

CaptainShuddup says

There were plenty of home buying experiences chronicled on Patnet.

It would be fun to follow someone from idea all the way through eventual purchase though. Hopefully the purchase of a good deal, meaning less than the cost of renting. It would be depressing to see someone blow years of labor and then also reward realtors for screwing them over when they could have simply rented for much less.

CaptainShuddup says

There were plenty of home buying experiences chronicled on Patnet.

It would be fun to follow someone from idea all the way through eventual purchase though.

And we could post there photo and vote on "Smart or Not" (similar to the "Hot or not" website).

There simply aren't enough people involved on patrick.net for this to work. Take your numbers and start crunching them. Housing within a zip code varies by a huge amount. Housing on a street varies by a huge amount! Pricing, layouts, age, size, bedrooms, etc. There are so many variables. Now you're going to need to find a seller and a buyer in the same area that matches up with that criteria.

Then you have to remember that these two people need to come to terms. That means, these two people have to work out a deal without insulting and pissing each other off. Most people can't bargain or negotiate on simple items in life. So, maybe you magically find two people on your site, and then they rub each other the wrong way. This is where realtors come into play, and one reason they don't want buyers and sellers meeting. Because they ruin deals.

If people on average sell every 7 years, unless they're on their 3rd or 4th house, they likely have no idea of what to look for, what to do, or how to proceed with a FSBO. It could take them 6 months or more to get financing lined up and in place.

pkennedy says

There are so many variables. Now you're going to need to find a seller and a buyer in the same area that matches up with that criteria.

There is always a chicken and egg problem in starting these things. I think the key is:

1. Make it super duper easy to post your house or post what you want to buy.
2. Give them some value that the mainstream system is not giving them.

One value is in dealing directly, knowing your realtor is not screwing you over somehow for their own profit, and knowing that neither side has to pay the 6%.

What is other value I can provide that the mainstream system does not?

One suggestion: Make it super duper easy to FIND what you want to buy.

Many of the websites I (used to) use don't have enough search criteria for my non-negotiables. For example, I insist on a 3 car garage on the house I’ll purchase, but almost no searches let me specify that.

When I have to click on every 3/2 that has a pool to find the front yard photo then scan the listing to see if it possibly has a tandem 3-car that's not visible from the photo, the website becomes too tedious for me to use. Bye bye. Perfect reason why I won’t use Craigslist.

Check boxes and keyword searches are amazingly helpful. Some things you have to have a check box for, like my garage requirement, as a keyword search just won’t work.

I've sold several houses myself and really enjoyed the experience, I would love to buy without a realtor, as long as I found a seller without a realtor with a house I wanted.

exflirt says

One suggestion: Make it super duper easy to FIND what you want to buy.

Many of the websites I (used to) use don't have enough search criteria for my non-negotiables. For example, I insist on a 3 car garage on the house I’ll purchase, but almost no searches let me specify that.

Hmmm, how to get that info? I'd think the seller, his agent, or a neighbor or former resident would have to enter that.

Many of the websites I (used to) use don't have enough search criteria for my non-negotiables. For example, I insist on a 3 car garage on the house I’ll purchase, but almost no searches let me specify that.

Hmmm, how to get that info? I'd think the seller, his agent, or a neighbor or former resident would have to enter that.

This is a full listing view of an MLS listing. As you can see there's every field you can imagine to search by, including number of garages. It can be set up so that when anything that matches your criteria it emails you the listing as soon as it hits the MLS. Public websites are a joke. You get what you pay/work for.

CaptainShuddup says

Always came back and told me, they already had contracts on them.

You would never get an argument from me that there are thousands of bad Real Estate agents. The Board of Realtors went on a membership drive that brought in all kinds of yahoos who don't know anything.

There are however hundreds of agents that are well worth the commission, and do get out of the car every day to talk people into selling a property.

Real Estate is a two way street. There are buyer, and listing agents. There are good buyer's agents who network in a community, and with other Real Estate agents.

Most people don't take the time to look for a good agent. They are so focussed on the home search that they by pass the search for a good agent.

You know who the Top Producers are, but do you know who's good? Do you have those conversations with agents, or are you too busy looking at the internet?

To find the home you want you have to be out there. You need to knock on doors, answer inquiries to your advertising, and be involved in the community.

Are you really seeking out these kinds of agents, or avoiding them?

pkennedy says

unless they're on their 3rd or 4th house, they likely have no idea of what to look for, what to do, or how to proceed with a FSBO.

When I was working for a FSBO company I was amazed how people managed to work things out. If both sides are motivated things just fall into place. If one of the two sides isn't really motivated then you need other parties who are motivated such as a Realtor to facilitate things.

It wouldn't take long before the "pros" got in there and ruined it anyway. House buyers would expect they're getting a good deal, but with such limited inventory they're not going to have the best places to compare against.

The pros will flip a house, jack up the prices and sell to someone for much more than that 6% would have cost them.

At first, there will be no one. You'll have to fight that battle for a very long time. You'll have to dump a lot of money into advertising this new way of buying and selling a house. Lots of it.

After you get some people, you'll start getting the pros in there, and you'll have to fight that battle, while losing the first battle again, as people stop using your "scam" system.

What you could offer is an MLS listed property, with no realtors on one end. However, it won't take long before the MLS decides you're hurting their model and boots you. Not until you're so ingrained in their system and sunk so much money into it, that they can kill your company by turning it off for just a few months.

This is not a battle for the shallow pockets to attack, even deep pockets aren't likely to fight it for very long.

CaptainShuddup says

Furthermore, after I quit consulting Realtors, I still had realtors emailing me MLS. Every house I was even remotely interested in, I had already seen weeks before on either... Craigslist, Zillow, Ziprealty, Trulia or Realtor.com.
MLS is totally useless.

I have no idea why it would take you a week to get listings. I've taught the MLS to Realtors for the past ten years. I know it like the back of my hand. It was never delayed. Listings show on the MLS within seconds of becoming active. In fact it sends out emails to clients so fast their first emails usually have no photos added yet. When the photos are added, even if it's ten minutes later, the system sends another email to them with photos (if the Realtor configures it properly.) What can get me pissed off is when it takes days for the listing to show up in realtor.com because if it doesn't show up there it's not going to syndicate to all the other lesser sites you mentioned. Sometimes I have to call realtor.com to find out what the problem is.

The MLS (the local board) is the PRIMARY SOURCE where the data originates. Realtor.com (the national board) is the secondary source of data. All other sites feed from realtor.com.

Patrick should consider setting up a clearinghouse for all the FSBO sites which are all independents. They may be doing this already, but bringing them all together into one searchable directory (big job), would create a whole new ballgame. The trick is to get people on board, may take a year or two but it's the only way to start putting the MLS and NAR out of business.

everything says

Patrick should consider setting up a clearinghouse for all the FSBO sites which are all independents. They may be doing this already, but bringing them all together into one searchable directory (big job), would create a whole new ballgame. The trick is to get people on board, may take a year or two but it's the only way to start putting the MLS and NAR out of business.

If the directory only has FSBO listings then how is it going put NAR out of business? No one who seriously needs to sell their home is going to screw around trying to sell it FSBO. People who sell FSBO either are selling on the MLS too, have major issues with Realtors, have plenty of time to experiment, or have been terribly misinformed.

Back in the day, I sold over a thousand FSBO (buyowner.com) ad programs to sellers. Only around 20% sold without having to resort to the MLS. Many I listed side by side in both the MLS and FSBO with the FSBO listed 6% cheaper and still most sold first through the MLS.

Miracles do happen. Sometimes all it takes is a yard sign and someone in the neighborhood comes along and buys the house for top dollar. Other times there's a perfect match but in general going FSBO only is seriously impairing your chances to get top dollar. I've seen dozens lose their home and hundreds of others get far too low a price because they were too stubborn to market their house to the fullest.

Buyer and sellers then privately chat on Patrick.net to see if they are interested in talking more about an FSBO sale

One big reason buyers and sellers hire Realtors is because they don't want to chat directly. Now if you could act as a mediator without actually practicing real estate you might have something there.

Call it Crazy says

What did they email over? Current crap I already viewed weeks before on the MLS....
Yep, Useless....

You're throwing away the baby with the bathwater...