All Forum Posts by: Jonathan Minerick

@Sandy Land Try googling "flat fee MLS" and you will find many providers of this service.

Here are the big things to look for in a flat fee MLS listing:

1. The listing MUST be on the local MLS.

There are hundreds of MLSs in the United States. Sellers want to be on the MLS that covers the area where their home is located, so they can offer a commission to LOCAL buyer agents.

2. Cost to List + Changes to Listing.

Can range from $100-$400 for the exact same listing on the MLS. Watch out for fine print that requires an additional fee at closing - this is a huge red flag and how most flat fee companies make money. Make sure you are able to make changes to the listing after it has been posted for a nominal fee. For example, we provide 10 free changes with any listing (and $5 per change after that). Most sellers use ~5-6 changes. Note that a change can be anything such as pictures, description, price, open house, and status.

3. Photos on MLS.

Make sure you can upload at least 12 photos. Some services offer a great price, but it's only for 1 photo - which is not useful for most properties. Home buyers are very easily visually influenced. Pictures work wonders and numerous studies have shown that pro photography pays for itself many times over.

4. Length of Listing.

Get at least a 6 month listing and be sure that there is no charge for cancellation. Homes rarely sell as quickly as their owners think they will, even when the owner is sure the home is priced perfectly.

5. How Buyers and Agents Are Connected to You.

Ensure your contact information goes into the MLS private remarks to agents. The MLS rules prevent your contact information from appearing on websites, but websites are required to show the listing broker phone number. Find a flat fee service that offers free call forwarding so buyers are able to connect with you instantly.

6. Fine Print.

You should never be required to use any closing service (e.g. escrow) provided by the flat fee service agent. Read the listing agreement carefully - you will be required to sign it in every state.

7. Be Careful With Referral Services

Many of the flat fee MLS listing service providers you come across on the internet are actually just middlemen. These referral services find flat fee agents in each state and then advertise flat fee MLS listing service to sellers. These referral services have you add property info, photos, etc. but then send your info to the listing agent who does the work (and gets paid by the referral service).

Here's the catch: The actual listing agent is going to need to send you the real listing input form for your local MLS. The generic form that the referral service had you fill out is basically useless. Check out the listing input forms for a residential property for two different MLSs: Los Angeles and San Diego (in case you want to see how different the forms can be). Note that many fields are required on the forms and typically only the seller is going to know the right info.

You will also be required by state law to sign a listing agreement with the listing agent. It can be very dangerous paying for a listing without knowing what terms you are going to be required to agree to. 

To recap: Be extremely cautious with flat fee MLS sites that only refer business to other agents.

Bonus Points

You should also consider the ease of use of the flat fee MLS listing provider, for example, can you complete everything online? How quickly is the listing added to the MLS? How quickly can changes be made? Is the agent easy to get in contact with?

The NAR stats on FSBOs are extremely misleading. The NAR report says:

• - FSBO sold for a median of $260,000, lower than the median of agent-assisted homes at $318,000

So the NAR claim is that FSBO homes sold for a whopping 18% less ($58,000) than agent listed homes. Read that again.

The truth, that you can ask anyone involved in real estate, is that FSBO homes are usually significantly overpriced. Does that make sense that a FSBO seller would go from being significantly overpriced to being 18% underpriced?

But how can the NAR finding be so wrong?

Aside from the obvious answer that they are a trade group for real estate agents, and they would not be around for long if they said that using an agent doesn't make a difference, here are a few reasons, which NAR acknowledges as not being factored in to their finding:

• - Lower priced properties are more likely to FSBO (e.g. commission costs are high relative to price, agents aren't as interested in selling low prices homes).
• - Rural homes are 3x more likely to FSBO than urban homes. Rural homes are $104,000 less, on average, than urban homes.
• - The NAR finding is not an apples to apples comparison. For example, a small home sold FSBO in the midwest compared to an custom home in Los Angeles are going to have very different price points. The NAR study treats them the same and tries to compare them against each other.
• - 57% of FSBO homes are sold to someone the seller knows (e.g. family, friend, etc).

Can we find any independent studies on FSBO vs agent listed homes? Yes, two studies from private research institutions:

• - Northwestern University "FSBO sellers ended up with a significantly enhanced net sale price because they didn't have to pay the brokerage commission that real estate agents charge seller" https://www.northwestern.edu/newscenter/stories/2007/06/fsbo.html
• - Stanford University: “The use of a broker does not significantly affect either the average initial asking price or the average selling price of a home” https://drive.google.com/file/d/1IdAEb6LJC6DH7BUltgOtIStkUYUvjnZW/view

The truth is that real estate is a market like any other. It is driven by supply and demand. Agents do not make homes sell for more money - which would also infer that a buyer would significantly overpay by buying a home listed by a real estate agent.

Real estate agents are useful for many reasons, but the myth that they will make a seller more money is not one of them.

If you are looking to get the same marketing the MLS offers without paying the huge fees, do a flat fee MLS listing. It will cost you $100-$200 to get on the local MLS and all the major real estate websites.

@Daniel Murphy Consider doing a flat fee MLS listing (like @John Underwood mentions). You get the marketing exposure you need on the MLS, which syndicates out to the major websites like realtor.com, redfin, zillow, etc. It is the best marketing you can do and costs very little ($100-$200). 

I'd recommend you offer the buyer agents a commission, but make sure the flat fee company doesn't collect anything if the buyer comes without an agent.

My BP blog post on what to look for from flat fee listing: https://www.biggerpockets.com/...

@Jay Chopra We are now licensed in New Jersey and will be able to list on the MLS there within 2-3 weeks.

@Jeyo Punnakottil You can verify what they said by looking at the HAR MLS rules. Paragraph 1.2 (b):

Physical Property Description - Public 

The Physical Property Description - Public field is intended to describe the physical attributes of the listed property only. Remarks related to the transaction such as available financing, cash back at closing, bonuses, upgrade incentives, upgrade allowances, repair and decorating allowances, etc. shall not be entered in the Physical Property Description - Public field. 

Confidential information such as showing instructions or security codes and contact information such as names, phone numbers, email addresses, web site addresses, service provider information, the words FSBO or For Sale by Owner shall not be entered in the Physical Property Description - Public field.

@Sam Tright Zillow will automatically overwrite any FSBO listing with the MLS listing information. They don't allow the property to appear as both MLS listed and FSBO. The only way to stop this is to disable the MLS feed to the websites.

Unfortunately, you cannot disable the MLS feed just to Zillow, you would have to disable all websites from receiving the MLS feed. This means you would be losing out on other popular websites such as redfin, realtor.com, broker sites, etc.

The flat fee broker should be passing all unrepresented buyer leads to you, so its best to keep the MLS feed going out to websites.

@Ricardo Taboada

1. You'll usually be fine with 2.5% commission.

2. Well over 90% of the time, someone other than the listing agent finds the buyer. Use a flat fee service and offer the buyer agents a reasonable commission. If the listing agent finds the buyer, it can be a yellow flag.

3. Be sure to use a flat fee broker that passes unrepresented buyers directly to you without trying to collect the buyer agent commission.

4. Check out our BP blog post on the most important things to look for in a flat fee listing.

We do flat fee listings in 14 states, including California. We charge a one-time fee $95 to list on the MLS. No hidden costs and nothing due at closing to us. We have 100+ reviews on Yelp, nearly all are 5 star.

-12 month MLS listing (free to cancel)
-FREE call forwarding + info by text
-FREE automatic email forwarding
-FREE state and federal disclosures
-FREE listing page
-10 FREE listing changes
-Unlimited photos on the MLS
-Listed on Realtor.com, Redfin, Trulia, Zillow, more...
-Complete and manage 100% online
-Cancel for FREE anytime
-No obligation to buy anything else
-Offer agents any commission you like

Hi @Andrew Nagy

When you list on the MLS, websites (redfin, realtor.com, zillow, etc) will automatically pull in the listing information from the MLS. The MLS rules prohibit the sellers information from displaying on the websites - however - the websites are required to display the listing agents phone or email.

What you want to do is find a flat fee listing agent that offers automatic call forwarding (full disclosure, we are a flat fee agent and offer this). What automatic call forwarding means is that when a buyer sees your home on a website (e.g. redfin) the buyer will be able to call the listing agent number and be automatically connected to the seller just by providing the phone system some basic property info (street number, zip code, or MLS number).

The advantages of automatic call forwarding are 1) It works 24 hours a day since it is software (and not humans), and 2) It connects the buyer live to the seller.

Also note that the flat fee agent should be placing your contact information as the seller directly in the Private Remarks to Agents field of the MLS, so the buyer agents know to contact the seller direct. 90% of buyers have agents, so this is important that agents know to deal direct with the seller.

 @Dan H. Still here :)

@Lionel Quiambao Yes, we do flat rate listings in the local Sacramento MLS for $95. Please feel free to reach out if you have questions about how that works.