The CLAW Saga Gets More Interesting: Art Carter Administers A Beatdown on Annie Ives

The CLAW/TheMLS saga gets more interesting. For background, read this Inman News article by Andrea Brambila, who does consistently decent reporting on these arcane issues for our industry. Basically, CLAW decided to delay syndication feeds via ListHub by 48 hours. Chaos ensued. I’m trying to find out some more stuff about it, but the latest … Read more

Dear MLS – Raise Prices, By A Lot

I have to be on an airplane in the not-too-distant future, but I really wanted to share this with everyone, because I think it’s so interesting. So fascinating. Recently, I asked a hypothetical question in one of my favorite Facebook groups: If you click on over, you can read all the comments. What I was … Read more

The Realcomp Anti-Trust Ruling Will Affect MLS Syndication

Inman News reports that the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled against Realcomp II in a years-long case: Michigan’s largest multiple listing service “unreasonably restrained competition” among real estate brokers by refusing to transmit exclusive agency property listings favored by discount brokers to Realtor.com and other public-facing Web sites, a federal appeals court has ruled. … Read more

In Which I Have Fun With Sam DeBord’s Inman Article on Pocket Listing Liability

It’s a busy day here, but I couldn’t resist this. 🙂 Sam DeBord, a really intelligent and perceptive guy, who is also a working broker for Coldwell Banker Danforth in Seattle, wrote a long column on Inman about the possibility of huge liabilities for brokerages because of pocket listings. Read the whole thing. There are … Read more

In Which I Have Fun With Sam DeBord's Inman Article on Pocket Listing Liability

It’s a busy day here, but I couldn’t resist this. 🙂 Sam DeBord, a really intelligent and perceptive guy, who is also a working broker for Coldwell Banker Danforth in Seattle, wrote a long column on Inman about the possibility of huge liabilities for brokerages because of pocket listings. Read the whole thing. There are … Read more

Dear Brokerages – First, Get The Basics Right

Thanks to a project I’ve been working on for the past few days, I’ve had the pleasure(?) of visiting a number of brokerage websites. As I write this post, Inman NYC is in full-swing, where tech people, consultants, vendors, and experts are telling the assembled brokers and agents on the latest and greatest in innovation. … Read more

Seven Predictions for 2014: Power Ballads Edition

I wanted to get to this before 2014 dawned, of course, but… it was more fun to hang out with my boys. And by that I don’t mean my posse of secret real estate pundits, but my actual biological progeny. In any event, it’s customary here at Notorious to make predictions that are sure to … Read more

Grading Time! Reviewing My 2013 Predictions

Welcome to another edition of an annual tradition, in which I go back and grade myself on my predictions made at the start of this year. My track record so far: 2010 Predictions: 6 of 10 (.600) 2011 Predictions: 4.5 of 7 (.642) 2012 Predictions: 2 for 7 (.286) As ever, I hope to be … Read more

Notorious POD: Episode 10 – More on AgentMatch with Ernie Graham of Realtor.com

  In this episode, Ernie Graham, Director of Product Management for REALTOR.com, joins us for an in-depth discussion about AgentMatch, what consumers want, and what the industry needs to do. AgentMatch — a system in beta testing in two markets — has been controversial of late because it uses MLS data to “rank” agents based … Read more