Let capitalism cook: The case for repealing MLS clear cooperation rules

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The rational case for repealing MLS Clear Cooperation rules.

Does cc work? Do I benefit from it? Would I like it to stay in place? Yes.

Is it best for consumers, (who anti-trust laws are designed to protect?) It depends.

Are we comparing it to Compass’ gamesmanship ushering in a worst-case scenario where buyers need to go through 20 brokerage websites to see all that’s available?

Or are we comparing it to a mature free market where actual competition compels the existing infrastructure to improve by simply opening the door to competition that could disintermediate it?

MLS system offers transparency, but at what cost?

MLS is not capitalism in its final form. In fact, if the industry started over from scratch today, there is almost no chance we’d end up with 400+ MLSs each with their own management team, data structures and rules.

Every year I get a postcard on my birthday from my MLS, My MLS pays for technology that I’ll never use and they put on training I rarely attend. Since I started writing this article, I’ve also discovered that my dues paid for dog watching services while ‘volunteers’ scored thousand dollar Hamilton tickets. To me and most agents I know, the value of the MLS is in the database and few want to subsidize the programs that we don’t benefit from and neither do consumers.

Cost absorbed by consumers can be measured in $ Billions to keep the current structure in place. The math is simple, I pay $1,200 a year in associations and MLS dues and there are 1.5M agents who like me are also required to pass along this cost to consumers.

Due to CC, practitioners are required to give their valuable data to brokers and marketing intermediaries alike. Companies like Zillow, Reatlor.com and lead gen companies of all shapes and sizes use this data to add billions in costs to consumers. If these companies had to source their own data to draw in customers, their businesses would look quite different than they do today and this would likely benefit consumers more than being sold to agents with a 40% markup. I recently wrote at article ‘Golden Goose of real estate’ that explains real estate’s Referral fee problem that exists primarily because of CC. … Read More