Where Is The Best Place To Find MLS Listings For Home Buyers
Posted Aug 27, 2008 @ 5:06 pm, Viewed by 747 Visitors, Read 1038 Times.
This may seem like a simple question here on realestatewebmasters.com, but to the average Joe, do you think they know? In fact many people that think they know the right answer would answer this incorrectly (if you're not searching in the right place you may miss your dream home).
Unfortunaly the majority of consumers do not know what agents know when it comes time to find the best and most complete, up to date source for real estate listings.
The typical home buyer wants to know about all the real estate listings on the MLS that fit their specific wants and needs. There are some large companies out there that have deceived the public, they boast of 3 million plus listings accross the country, they offer worthless zestimates and heat maps and they want you to believe they are the best source for real estate listings. The fact is when you search places like Trulia, Zillow, Homegain, Yahoo Real Estate and Google Base you only see a fraction of the listings.
Real Estate is local and the best source for any area is the local MLS which real estate agents with websites usually provide in the form of IDX solutions or VOW on their website. The IDX & VOW provides a complete list of homes from the local MLS, rather than a partial list provided by 3rd party websites.
How can you tell if the place you are searching for a home is providing you with all the listings via an IDX or VOW? When you are looking at an actual listing of a home or property, look towards the bottom of the listing and you should see "IDX" or "VOW"and if you don't, do yourself a favor and find a website that does provide all the local listings. You can't make an informed decision without all the facts.
One last point that many home buyers don't realize is that a local real estate agent that has all the MLS listings on their website, generally does not charge a buyer anything to purchase a listed property and will in fact likely save you money by using their negotiating skills to help you get the best price and terms available. Happy house hunting!
Dennis Pease - RE/MAX Integrity Real Estate Broker invites you to see more Eugene Oregon Real Estate information and All the Area Oregon Real Estate Listings via my Custom IDX Solution.
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Social Bookmarking4 Responses to “Where Is The Best Place To Find MLS Listings For Home Buyers”
You bring up a point that I missed and it is included in the post now. The 2 major MLS's that I have belonged to do not offer VOW. With the custom IDX's that are available now the line between IDX & VOW has become very fuzzy. I wrote this after reading an article at inman news that discussed a study done by the WAV Group and Roost.
http://tinyurl.com/6l8ld9
In Oregon all the listings on the MLS are also on my IDX.
Cool, Dennis. If a prospect goes on an IDX search in my area (since it's simple and requires no registration), the only way they'll know they're not getting every listing is if they know of a property up for sale that doesn't show up. So unless they do a little further searching, they think they're getting everything. And it's a big difference between IDX & VOW because so many brokers opted out of IDX when it was started.
My prior broker offered both IDX and VOW but it was confusing. No matter what instructions you put, most prospects didn't read why they should register when they were finding listings without having to. That's why I only offer VOW and try to explain it all.
Good points folks. I saw the post at Inman and have been following the comments.
We don't have VOW here but we do get roughly 95% or more IDX participation in both our major MLS boards.
I actually had a call this morning from a gal in Michigan inquiring about a property in The Cape. The info she had on the listing (found on one of the public sites) was almost 30 days old . Imagine her surprise when I informed her the price had actually been dropped by $25K in the interim.
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Real Estate Broker Dennis Pease sells Florence Oregon Real Estate and as Broker with RE/MAX Integrity in Eugene Oregon has Created one of the most Advanced, Consumer Friendly and Interactive Real Estate Websites in Oregon. Read More
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This is the 2nd post I've read reminding people that these big real estate portals don't show all available active listings. In fact, in Northern IL our IDX does not show all active listings, only VOW, which is what I offer on my sites. However, with VOW you have to register, but I explain on my site what buyers & sellers would be missing if they only search on an IDX that does not require registration. That might be the perfect property for them.