Seven Predictions for 2013: The AKUS Experience

  Once again, it is time for the world famous (in my own mind at least) annual tradition of making predictions for the coming year that are Guaranteed to be Wrong, or Your Money Back! This year, I thought I would pay tribute to the greatest musical act still working today: Alison Krauss and Union … Read more

When Life Hands You Citrons, Make Citronade: In Which I Differ With Smart Analysts

  I’ve gotten more than one request from readers to discuss the brutal analysis report on Zillow by Citron Research. I didn’t think I’d have much to add to a stock analyst’s report that tends to be heavy on financial metrics and such, but it turns out that the Citron Research report is indeed worth … Read more

Magical Thinking vs. Boring Reality

  Facebook can sometimes be a gold mine for content. Consider these two seemingly unrelated events: Marie is a friend who used to work in the real estate industry, as the Director of Marketing for MRIS. She relocated to Florida, and asked me months ago for some agents I knew in the area. I didn’t, … Read more

Description is Not Prescription: A Response to Brian Larson on IDX

  One of the guys I respect most in this business — indeed, one of the guys I learned the most from just by reading his excellent blog, MLS Tesseract — is Brian Larson of Larson, Sobotka. Brian was a key player in the creating of IDX back in the late 90’s and probably has … Read more

In Which I Solve the Syndication Problem, Once And For All

  Let’s suppose that you’re some graduate student at Beijing University and you want to write a paper on the major issues confronting the American real estate industry. So you start googling and going to blogs (like this one maybe) and open groups on Facebook and whatnot to find out what critical issues are top … Read more

A Small Step, Fraught With Significance: ListHub Introduces "MLS Preferred" Concept

  Back in November of 2010, I wrote about Move’s acquisition of ListHub and what it might mean for “Syndication Quality”. I thought then that the reason why Move acquired ListHub was strategic — to control the source of listing data, in order to impose on its main competitors the same restrictions that Move had … Read more

A Small Step, Fraught With Significance: ListHub Introduces “MLS Preferred” Concept

  Back in November of 2010, I wrote about Move’s acquisition of ListHub and what it might mean for “Syndication Quality”. I thought then that the reason why Move acquired ListHub was strategic — to control the source of listing data, in order to impose on its main competitors the same restrictions that Move had … Read more