Real estate brokers urge MLSs to modernize before agents find workarounds

Robert Reffkin may be grabbing headlines with his fight over office exclusives, but Compass International Holdings is hardly the only brokerage pushing MLSs to change. At the Council of MLS’s Open House conference Wednesday, brokerage leaders laid out a broader list of frustrations — from slow response times and inconsistent data standards to territorial boundaries and cumbersome technology. Their message was equally blunt: If MLSs don’t become better partners to brokers, some brokerages may simply find ways to work around them. On a panel moderated by CMLS CEO Jessica Edgerton, Gretchen Rosenberg of HomeServices of America, Dennis Cestra of Howard Hanna Real Estate Services, Paul Boomsma of Leading Real Estate Companies of the World, Al Becker of Jack Conway and Holly Mabery of eXp Realty discussed where the MLS model is creating friction — and what needs to change before that friction becomes something more serious. Who’s got the pain For Rosenberg and Boomsma, the largest pain points expressed by their brokers and agents is the lack of responsiveness from their MLSs. “Whenever they are reaching out to their MLS provider, asking for help with a project or answers to questions abo...