I have a lot of respect for my friend, John Mosey, who has more than 30 years in the MLS Industry as a vendor  and as the CEO of Northstar MLS® in Minnesota. John shares his wisdom and experience with us in the latest interview with Susie Hale, Frogpond. (another wise person in our business).  Take a few minutes to learn from John and comment. Click here to read John’s interview  Read More →

  I recently saw the 2012 Academy award winning best picture, “The Artist”, and I couldn’t help but see many similarities between the movie and the real estate industry.  It’s a great story about change and what happens to those in the world who resist it. Consider the character George Valentin, who is in the prime of his life and his career.  He is popular; he is loved by all. His movies are always big hits.  Everything is going his way.  Isn’t this like MLS’s several years ago before the Internet and consumer’s access to information?  Realtors... [Read more]

Kevin is excellent as a facilitator especially when bringing in several MLSs to work together.  He is very knowledgeable and insightful, he will make you and your team work and be engaged throughout the entire process; which is exactly what you want!  He delivered exactly what we wanted and it is working great.  Of the three MLS’s in our area, we all saved money but more importantly we added services at a lower cost to the members.  In my market, the biggest winners were the Brokers. The one key point that if I could go back and change is that I would have hired Kevin... [Read more]

Over my career I have been to countless planning sessions.  Kevin did a great job preparing for the meeting so that in less than a day and a half the participants went straight to the meat of the matter and garnered frank and honest conversations with the entire group.  He also did a wonderful job assuring everyone in the room participated.  Great job!  Read More →

Seems like just about everyone is commenting on various positions about listing syndication and the future of IDX.  I have some thoughts on the subject, which I will begin to share with you now.  I will not re-hash what this broker or that MLS are doing, because they have the right to do what they are doing.  I respect them for taking a stand and moving to action.  Our industry needs more leaders like these.  They are preparing for and creating their own future, while others are making predictions.   Most of the predictions will likely be wrong.   Stale Listings.... [Read more]

Leaders of REALTOR associations and MLSs have 3 options and it’s time to pick one. Over the holidays, I read “Flash Foresight” by Daniel Burrus, which I highly recommend. Burrus says, “predicting the future is easy … but predicting it accurately is hard”. Can you relate? He goes on to say that we are generally too focused on our current challenges (the housing market, difficult transactions, challenges in lending, etc.). Instead, he recommends that you think about the challenges and problems you are ABOUT to have next.  If that is difficult,... [Read more]

Like so many of you, I have been thinking about how to make a bigger difference in 2012 by giving back to the real estate community.  You have been so amazing and good to me for nearly 30 years and I want to do more.  There has never been a better time to listen and understand the challenges so many leaders are facing right now, due to the big shifts taking place in organized real estate. My wife Sue and I give graciously to our church and other organizations throughout the year.  In 2012, I will commit 10% of my time to giving back to the community by sharing my talents... [Read more]

… some challenges and successes relating to digital music and parallels between the music and real estate industries.  Mike Masnick will speak about this at Inman Data Summit January 25 – 26. For instance, as consumers now have ever more real estate-related information at their fingertips from both third-party and industry sites, the role of the real estate professional has shifted from gatekeeper of information to enabler, Masnick said. “There is still a role for middlemen to (help consumers) understand the process and the pitfalls and the best practices... [Read more]

30 leading REALTOR associations in South Carolina and Indiana are working together to identify new ways for reducing operating costs, balancing budgets and becoming indispensable to their members. This group represents a “cooperative” of 28,000 REALTORs (95%) across two entire states. REALTOR association execs and board members are well aware of the “value crisis” that is brewing. Membership is declining and so is income. Technology is moving faster than most association decision-making and the data, which used to be exclusive to the local MLS, is... [Read more]

I don’t typically plug conferences and we all have plenty of meetings to attend, but I want to make sure you know about this one.  If you are going to Inman SFO in July, you might want to add the Inman Data Summit to your travel plan. This is a first ever event for Inman and I am honored to be involved on the Board of Advisors with some of the smartest people in the business.   Check it out and I hope to see you there on July 25-26.  I will also be staying the rest of the week.  Why not, it’s San Francisco! I’ll keep you posted with more details of... [Read more]