It has been said that necessity is the mother of all inventions and it seems the real estate industry is finding itself coming up with new ideas. A few years back, prior to the real estate collapse, consumers didn’t have the means to quickly identify properties as short sales, bank owned, or what can be considered a standard seller.
Before getting into the new changes it is probably worth reviewing a little history preceding the changes. The problem arose when excited buyers would inquire on a home to why the listing price was so much lower than competing homes. Feeling like they found the buy of the century and anxious to write a Purchase and Sale, buyers were quickly discouraged upon finding out the property was in a short sale situation.
The NWMLS took note of the problem and in 2009 released an update to their system allowing agents to exclude or only include short sales, bank owned or standard sellers. If a property was a short sale most buyers would immediately removed it from their lists especially since the First Time Homebuyer Tax Credit’s deadline was approaching.
But still consumers could not directly see for themselves if a home was a short sale or bank owned. Now that has changed. In December 2009, I was pleasantly surprised to find these upgrades found their way to the public real estate search sites. Right nowm, buyers can only differentiate between properties from standard sellers and bank owned, note the two different MLS search links.
Though the upgrades makes it easy to separate standard and banked owned properties it does not do anything for the appearance of short sales. A system should be fairly simple to build but granted I am sitting here describing the features instead of developing the code for it. When a real estate agent uploads a home to the NWMLS there are various fields that can be checked or not checked. From water front and swimming pools to builders and neighborhoods, the variety is endless and that is why getting as much information about a home makes the property far more searchable.
Consumers still don’t have the luxury of excluding short sales from their results like agents do. No fear though as they can be identified under the Property Details in the Residential field.
Maybe in the near future short sales will be able to be filtered like bank owned and standard listings. Another item to touch on though not directly related to search fields are the NWMLS’s 2010 MLS numbers.
Historically, MLS numbers where a 8 digit code given to the property when it was uploaded to the NWMLS’s database. The first two digits of the number represented what year the home was listed. If a home was listed in 2007 then the first two digits where 27, if listed in 2008 they where 28 and so on. At the start of the 2010 though the numbers where changed to a 3 digit code starting with 100 and will continue in a linear fashion. The very First Listing of 2010 Award goes to a home in Shelton Washington.
As of right now, public IDXs are having problems processing the new 3 digit code and as a result the properties may not be displayed, happening on this site. If you seen a home and it has the 3 digit MLS code please email or call me and I will send the information over.
It has me curious as to what type of technology will be the norm by the end of 2010. Will users demand websites to have a mobile friendly website or an app with all the homes for sale? It has me thinking.
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Changes to the NWMLS means Easier Searching for Consumers
It has been said that necessity is the mother of all inventions and it seems the real estate industry is finding itself coming up with new ideas. A few years back, prior to the real estate collapse, consumers didn’t have the means to quickly identify properties as short sales, bank owned, or what can be considered a standard seller.
Before getting into the new changes it is probably worth reviewing a little history preceding the changes. The problem arose when excited buyers would inquire on a home to why the listing price was so much lower than competing homes. Feeling like they found the buy of the century and anxious to write a Purchase and Sale, buyers were quickly discouraged upon finding out the property was in a short sale situation.
The NWMLS took note of the problem and in 2009 released an update to their system allowing agents to exclude or only include short sales, bank owned or standard sellers. If a property was a short sale most buyers would immediately removed it from their lists especially since the First Time Homebuyer Tax Credit’s deadline was approaching.
But still consumers could not directly see for themselves if a home was a short sale or bank owned. Now that has changed. In December 2009, I was pleasantly surprised to find these upgrades found their way to the public real estate search sites. Right nowm, buyers can only differentiate between properties from standard sellers and bank owned, note the two different MLS search links.
– Standard MLS Listing Search
– Banked Owned Listing Search
Though the upgrades makes it easy to separate standard and banked owned properties it does not do anything for the appearance of short sales. A system should be fairly simple to build but granted I am sitting here describing the features instead of developing the code for it. When a real estate agent uploads a home to the NWMLS there are various fields that can be checked or not checked. From water front and swimming pools to builders and neighborhoods, the variety is endless and that is why getting as much information about a home makes the property far more searchable.
Consumers still don’t have the luxury of excluding short sales from their results like agents do. No fear though as they can be identified under the Property Details in the Residential field.
Maybe in the near future short sales will be able to be filtered like bank owned and standard listings. Another item to touch on though not directly related to search fields are the NWMLS’s 2010 MLS numbers.
Historically, MLS numbers where a 8 digit code given to the property when it was uploaded to the NWMLS’s database. The first two digits of the number represented what year the home was listed. If a home was listed in 2007 then the first two digits where 27, if listed in 2008 they where 28 and so on. At the start of the 2010 though the numbers where changed to a 3 digit code starting with 100 and will continue in a linear fashion. The very First Listing of 2010 Award goes to a home in Shelton Washington.
As of right now, public IDXs are having problems processing the new 3 digit code and as a result the properties may not be displayed, happening on this site. If you seen a home and it has the 3 digit MLS code please email or call me and I will send the information over.
It has me curious as to what type of technology will be the norm by the end of 2010. Will users demand websites to have a mobile friendly website or an app with all the homes for sale? It has me thinking.