What is the point?
“I’m really trying to figure out what your point is,” James Dwiggins, co-CEO NextHomehe said. “One day nothing will change when it comes to real estate advertising unless we’re in a strong seller’s market where you have a million buyers ready to jump on any listing, but we’re not in that market right now. Buyers are scarce, interest rates are high, and I don’t know how, in a market like this, private or soon-to-be listings won’t see many items before 4 hours. Then get ready to write an offer.”
In Syd Liebovitch’s market, the MLS allows listings to remain in the upcoming status for up to 21 days, but during that time the property is not allowed to be displayed.
“Buyers who see a home online want to see it NOW! There is a lot of research on the speed of responding to buyer inquiries and a quick response is important,” said the California-based president. Residences at Rodeo Realty he wrote in an email to HousingWire. “Buyers, especially those who are very serious, who often pay a lot of money, such as those who sold their homes and had to buy another one, transferred to the area, or who just want to buy and buy now, want to see the house as soon as they see it on the Internet.”
In Liebovitch’s experience, buyers who may have been interested in a property soon tend to forget about the property or move on to something else by the time the listing is available for viewing. Because of this, he doesn’t believe it’s in the seller’s best interest to show the property before it’s ready for the best viewing.
Some say there is a benefit to advance advertising
Across the country in Massachusetts, Chip Stella, owner of a Wellesley-based retailer Rutledge Propertieshe agrees that properties should be shown at their best, but he still sees the value of earlier marketing coming to the latter list. Within Stella’s MLS, which is owned by a broker and not a Realtor owned or affiliated organization, he said there is an upcoming feature that other sellers are currently using.
“You’re using the soon-to-be situation because if there’s an active listing on the market and active buyers in the market who are looking at properties like the one you have, you want them to be able to look at your listing and compare it to the active inventory so they can decide if they want to view your property before making an offer on any active inventory,” he said.
There are too many sites to search for listings
Despite the use cases for upcoming listings, sellers and agents see some problems. For Stella, who runs a small independent brokerage, as more brokers announce partnerships with different sites or even launch their own pre-marketing platform, firms like hers are forced to look at several different sites to find new listings.
“We have to be on Compass.com, Zillow, Redfin, Realtor.com and now we have to be doubly sharp to find the next listing for our buyers,” Stella said. “This doesn’t do the consumer any favors. Putting these things in one place would make things a lot easier, and we’ve had that in the MLS that has ‘worked well’ for decades.”
Dwiggins is also a firm believer in market planning and broad exposure of the inventory. Because of this, he feels eXp Realty’s approach to pre-marketing these upcoming listings is one of the best he’s seen so far, as the brokerage has said it’s willing to provide its upcoming listings to any site willing to take it.
MLSs need to be innovative now more than ever
Reflecting on the future of the upcoming listings, Dwiggins feels that the announcements made this week are a clear signal to the MLS that it is time to come up with a standard process that is coming soon.
“I don’t think there’s anything wrong with pre-marketing as a way of doing it as long as it’s not disguised as a private listing. I don’t mind coming soon if it’s transparent in the marketplace. I personally think that this should be MLS policy and that every MLS should find a reasonable approach to their market, but there should be something where all sellers have access to all markets. It’s broadcast that way, but it has to be shared through the MLS – you can’t pick and choose where you put your listing. of words.”
This selection and selection of where future listings appear, as well as the possibility to hide certain property statistics such as days on the market or price changes have resulted. Brown Harris Stevens CEO Bess Freedman will be worried about where the industry is taking now from the list coming soon.
“Coming Soon and pre-marketing listings are not new concepts. What has changed is narrative manipulation and measurement,” Freedman wrote in an email. “Pre-sale masks how long a home has been for sale as sellers say these homes aren’t technically ‘on the market’. But time is real no matter how you spin it, and it’s an important metric for many buyers and sellers. All of these tactics undermine a fair market, which is what makes our system work and work.”
Pre-sale properties can be helpful
Despite these concerns, agents and sellers who now have access to these marketing tools are grateful to have them.
“We recently applied to Redfin’s soon-to-be-listed property in Boston’s South End. We did several showings and strong early demand, and the property ended up being sold, due to inquiries, to a trade with another agent,” said Eric Johnson, who leads the Compass-brokered team. Mission Realty Advisorshe wrote in an email. “We advised the seller to go to the MLS for full disclosure, but choose to accept the offer based on the strength of the demand and the outcome. That’s the point: the homeowner had a choice. At the end of the day, this is not about the pre-sale against the MLS, it’s about whether the homeowner retains the right to choose how their home is sold, or whether the decision is decided by the forum.”
In New Jersey, Lisa Comito, regional manager of the Howard Hanna Rand Realtyhe said he and his team believe that pre-marketing should be used in a way that supports transparency and broad exposure and builds momentum for the official launch of the listing.
“Regarding HannaList, we view it as another tool to help our agents and clients navigate this evolving industry. It allows us to thoughtfully display properties in the pre-market stage while remaining consistent with our core philosophy of collaboration and cooperation within the buyer community,” Comito wrote in an email. “Like any tool, how it’s used is important. Our focus remains on giving sellers as much exposure as possible while maintaining a professional, ethical and transparent marketplace.”
It’s about the seller’s choice
eXp Realty agent Renee Funk agreed that limiting listing exposure is not a tactic an agent or seller should pursue if they want high competition or value, which is why she’s excited eXp has entered into exclusive sales deals to pre-market the company’s upcoming listings.
“The role and function of a professional agent is to understand all the tools available. Professional agents must have the knowledge and ability to educate clients on the strategies the client may choose to use in conjunction with their agent,” he wrote in an email. “eXp Realty offers many tools in the tool chest for agents, and eXp makes portal ‘open access’ available with a smart commitment to not be limited to special deals or any one portal. This buyer-first focus is a win for both buyer and agent.”
While these agents and buyers are excited to have access to these tools, Stella said she is not interested in pursuing an exclusive deal with the listing site in the near future.
“When we know we have inventory that will hit the market soon, we use bootstrap methods.
“Most of our listings are sold through our partners at other brokerages in the city, so we know that by going back to basics and informing other sellers about coming soon will work because, when you work with a highly skilled seller, you have your finger on the market and you know when things will hit the market,” he said. “The agents of those big companies who have those pre-marketing agreements are the ones calling my agents trying to find out if we have properties that are going to sell soon. Boots on the ground are working.”
Freedman, which faces tough competition in New York City from Redfin and Compass, now controls most of the market thanks to its acquisitions. Anywherehe is not worried either.
“Premarketing has been the preferred option for many years,” he wrote. “But if everyone is advertising more, is it pre-sales or just marketing?”
