What L'Affaire d'Errol et Curt Means: Brief Thoughts

I’m really, really, really slammed with work so this won’t be as in-depth and searching as I’d like, but I do think it’s important to put down these semi-brief thoughts, so I can figure out what I think about what Zillow’s recent personnel moves means. Let me not bury the lede. L’Affaire d’Errol et Curt … Read more

The CLAW Saga Gets More Interesting: Art Carter Administers A Beatdown on Annie Ives

The CLAW/TheMLS saga gets more interesting. For background, read this Inman News article by Andrea Brambila, who does consistently decent reporting on these arcane issues for our industry. Basically, CLAW decided to delay syndication feeds via ListHub by 48 hours. Chaos ensued. I’m trying to find out some more stuff about it, but the latest … Read more

A Good Step… First of Thousands on the Long Road

Just saw on Facebook that NAR has renamed the “Midyear Legislative Meetings & Trade Expo” — its annual meeting in Washington DC — to “REALTOR Party Convention & Trade Expo“. Seeing as how I’ve been preachin’ (to the choir, mostly) for quite some time that the REALTOR Association needs to focus on its core competency … Read more

Dear MLS – Raise Prices, By A Lot

I have to be on an airplane in the not-too-distant future, but I really wanted to share this with everyone, because I think it’s so interesting. So fascinating. Recently, I asked a hypothetical question in one of my favorite Facebook groups: If you click on over, you can read all the comments. What I was … Read more

The Realcomp Anti-Trust Ruling Will Affect MLS Syndication

Inman News reports that the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled against Realcomp II in a years-long case: Michigan’s largest multiple listing service “unreasonably restrained competition” among real estate brokers by refusing to transmit exclusive agency property listings favored by discount brokers to Realtor.com and other public-facing Web sites, a federal appeals court has ruled. … Read more

In Which I Have Fun With Sam DeBord's Inman Article on Pocket Listing Liability

It’s a busy day here, but I couldn’t resist this. 🙂 Sam DeBord, a really intelligent and perceptive guy, who is also a working broker for Coldwell Banker Danforth in Seattle, wrote a long column on Inman about the possibility of huge liabilities for brokerages because of pocket listings. Read the whole thing. There are … Read more

Why You Should Know About Aereo

I’m reasonably certain that 90%+ of my audience — that would be you — have no idea what Aereo is. And until recently, there was no real reason to know, unless you lived in the NYC area and just looooved over-the-air TV. But last Friday, the US Supreme Court chose to hear a case involving … Read more

Seven Predictions for 2014: Power Ballads Edition

I wanted to get to this before 2014 dawned, of course, but… it was more fun to hang out with my boys. And by that I don’t mean my posse of secret real estate pundits, but my actual biological progeny. In any event, it’s customary here at Notorious to make predictions that are sure to … Read more