Ask the Broker: Why would an MLS/IDX system forbid commingling with listings from other sources . . . ?

by Greg Swann

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

Giving my prominent proboscis a good hard tweak, a certain pseudonymous Scarlet Pimpernelesque semi-retired real estate weblogger asks: “Are you trying to say that the MLS’ are not fascist dictatorships???” The question refers to a weblog entry I posted last night chastising Trulia Blog for hyperbole in its complaints about MLS exclusivity. I actually have a lot, lot, lot to say about MLS disintermediation — but not now. For now, I’d like to take a swing at the issue Trulia raises, treating it more seriously than they did.

Here is the relevant rule from the Arizona Regional Multiple Listings Service’s IDX policies and procedures:

12. An IDX Broker may not modify, enhance or manipulate a Shared Listing. In addition, listing information from other sources may not be combined with IDX Listings. For instance, property listings from other multiple listing services, for sale by owner properties and properties not in the MLS may not be combined with the IDX Database.

Why would ARMLS have such a rule? I can offer some reasonable conjectures, but before I do, I should like to make a meta argument: Whether or not you agree with anything I might say, it remains that MLS systems have every right to make their own rules however they choose. If the rules make sense to the membership, they don’t have to make sense to you. In other words, quibbling with me, here, gets you nowhere.

So why might an MLS IDX system forbid commingling with listings from other sources?

How about to protect the MLS brand? Or to avoid confusion between fully-cooperating listings and de facto exclusive listings? How about to preserve the cooperative system that is the sine qua non of MLS listing?

Here’s an even better reason: To maintain the quality level of displayed listings. We make fun of MLS listing quality, but egregious listings are funny precisely because they stand out (which is what egregious means). MLS listings are amazingly detailed compared to FSBO or RealtyBot listings. The simplified ARMLS feed, which any agent can download on-line, contains 213 unique fields — and it excludes the photos, their captions, the virtual-tour link and the lead-based paint disclosure. An entry in my PropSmart.com feed is 31 lines. For Trulia.com, it’s 39 lines — with many, many lines of parasitic XML coding. Both of these feeds are extensible, but not by much. And, of course, a typical FSBO listing makes CraigsList.com look organized.

Here’s a true fact of my life: In dozens of attempts, I have never successfully made contact with a FSBO seller. Call, no answer, leave a message. Call, no answer, leave a message. Never once a returned phone call. It could be they’re afraid I’ll pull a Tom Hopkins on them, given that so many Realtors run FSBO-listing games. It could be they’re scared I’ll want to be paid for bringing them a buyer. I don’t think about work that way, but I can’t explain my philosophy to someone who won’t call back. Notwithstanding that FSBO houses are almost always over-priced, I simply don’t think of them as being serious, motivated sellers.

So we have conjecture and anecdote, neither of which requires a real estate broker’s license. The bottom line is this: An MLS system is an inventory of homes listed for sale by MLS members, and MLS members, for the most part, sell from that inventory. This is not at all different from any other retail sales business model. Why don’t Chevrolet dealerships sell new Ford trucks? Why doesn’t BestBuy sell pharmaceuticals? Why won’t WalMart sell CDs with obscene lyrics? Why don’t MLS systems promote listings from sellers and third-party vendors hostile to MLS systems? Because we are free to do as we choose in this country — at least for now. Get used to it…

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