I was at a trade show this week, and besides having much to contemplate with regards to whether to switch brokerages in the future, I learned a bit, too.
In one class, agents were talking about how they send buyer clients automated emails when new properties come on the market that meet their buyers’ defined criteria. I asked how they dealt with unrepresented sellers. The response was almost adequate, but what was most striking was the apparent difference between the Charlottesville real estate market and the California real estate market. A California agent approached me after the class and said that in California, state law dictated that within 72 of taking a listing, that property had to be put into the MLS. When I suggested that this might be an MLS rule, she was adamant that it was a California state law. Very, very different. Apparently they don’t have limited-service brokerages there. This is where you can search for homes in the Charlottesville area.
Also, Wolf-Net Technologies seems to have a mighty good mapping solution.
How can it be State Law? Isn’t the MLS basically a private creation?
My thoughts exactly. I firmly believe that she was and remains mistaken and uninformed, but I was surprised at her insistence on it being a state law. I debated asking her whether her commission was fixed by the same state law as well. 🙂
I’m not an expert on this, but I do practice in CA. I’m 99% it’s an MLS rule, not a state law. NAR and CAR have the legislators in their back pocket, but this would be pretty extreme.