May. 17, 2011 - Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

There are some critical aspects of the NAR IDX/Franchise opt-in rules that our clients were unclear of after the mid-year meetings. We asked NAR for some clarifications, which they provided, and which we are sharing below. You should expect this guidance to be formalized and provided directly by NAR in the very near future. However, since Clareity has MLS clients already working full-tilt to implement the opt-in in ways that may be contrary to NAR's guidance, we wanted to share this information immediately.

 Following is the guidance NAR plans to offer the industry regarding the IDX policy:

The action of the Board of Directors provides that while the current IDX policy will remain in effect until the committee reports back to the Board at the 2011 Annual Convention,  effective thirty days following the Directors’ action, display of IDX listings on franchisors’ websites will be permitted only if a listing broker affirmatively consents (“opts in”) to franchisor indexing and display.

That means:

• Franchisors have until Monday, June 13 to discontinue display of the listings of MLS Participants who have not affirmatively consented to display of their listings on franchisor websites.
• MLSs should implement means for Participants to affirmatively consent to display of their listings on franchisor websites.  Participants’ consent to franchisor display can be blanket or granted only to specified franchisors at the option  of Participants.
• Any direct data feed from MLSs to franchisors can only (after June 13th)  include the listings of Participants who have affirmatively consented to display of their listings on the franchisor(s)’ site(s).
•  Franchisees who provide IDX information directly to their franchisor - or have their site indexed by the franchisor - will need to let the franchisor know which participants have affirmatively consented to display of their listings on the franchisor's site.

Clareity would like to call special attention to the part of the guidance that specifies that Participants need to be able to opt-in to individual franchise sites, versus just having a single "opt into franchise sites" type field.

If you are an MLS executive or staff person, feel free to share your best practices about implementing this policy here.

May. 17, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

Matt,

Thank you for your posting.  This is valuable information that we have been looking for in the past 48 hours.  One piece of information that we are still missing is a list of every Franchisor that a broker can opt in or out of for their listings.  Do you have this list?

Thanks!

Jeremy

May. 17, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

I guess my question is kind of like Jeremy's.  How do I know who all the Franchisor's are?  I know the big three; C21, Keller Williams and RE/MAX International.  But there may be more.  Is there a list?  The blanket is A LOT easier and the "opt-out" would have been even easier.  Can they make this any more difficult?  I mean I have over 45,000 active listings to convert!  Maybe the brokers need to notify other franchisors directly kind of like the VOW rules?  We want to put the duty of scrubing the data on the backs of the franchisors if possible.

May. 17, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

Well, I started here on Realtor.org: http://tinyurl.com/443d7qd

• ASSIST-2-SELL INC.
• AVALAR NETWORK INC.
• BETTER HOMES REALTY INC.
• CENTURY 21 REAL ESTATE LLC
• COLDWELL BANKER REAL ESTATE CORP.
• CRYE-LEIKE, REALTORS
• ERA
• EXIT REALTY CORP. INTERNATIONAL
• GMAC REAL ESTATE
• HELP-U-SELL REAL ESTATE
• HOWARD HANNA HOLDINGS
• INTERNATIONAL REALTY PLUS INC.
• INTERO REAL ESTATE SERVICES
• JOHN L. SCOTT REAL ESTATE
• KELLER-WILLIAMS REALTY INC.
• LATTER & BLUM NETWORK
• PRUDENTIAL REAL ESTATE
• RE/MAX INTERNATIONAL
• REAL ESTATE ONE
• REAL LIVING
• REALTY EXECUTIVES INTERNATIONAL
• REALTY WORLD AMERICA INC.
• REECE & NICHOLS ALLIANCE INC.
• SOTHEBY’S INTERNATIONAL REALTY AFFILIATES INC.
• TUCKER ASSOCIATES INC.
• UNITED COUNTRY
• WEICHERT REAL ESTATE AFFILIATES INC.
• WINDERMERE REAL ESTATE

But, note that GMAC should now be rolled in with Real Living. There are perhaps other local/regional franchises missing and changes to be made.

May. 17, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

 I suspect that you only need to request an opt in to the franchise organizations that currently receive a data feed rather than the entire list.

May. 17, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

Victor, I believe you are exactly correct. But this is where it gets tricky. Some MLSs may manage a data feed to franchises and have a syndication infrastructure that supports this effort. But how can MLSs manage opting when some franchises may get data feeds from brokers or even by indexing sites?

I'm pretty sure it was not the intent of the NAR Board of Directors that MLSs would need to reprogram their systems to accommodate the participant opt-in. And I believe some MLSs may simply have brokers opt-in by other means (letter, fax, email, etc.) either directly or via the MLS to the franchise and leave them to sort out what they should or shouldn't display. Horrifyingly inefficient, but it could be done that way.

May. 17, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

I still think it's not logical to require a selective opt-in by franchise for each individual franchise as a part of this temporary situation.

It's all doable, but the selective opt-in makes this more complicated than it needs to be. A blanket opt-in to franchisor display is consistent with IDX and VOW policies, and has a lesser impact on changes to our RETS servers and the brokers and vendors who receive bulk data from us.

If you agree with me, then let Cliff and NAR know.

May. 18, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

May. 18, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

Two concerns I have 

1.  At no time during the committee meeting or the NAR directors meeting do I recall the opt-in to individual franchise sites being discussed.   

2.  This whole subject is supposed to be reviewed and studied by the committee before the convention in November.  My fear is the opt-in gets removed and all the implementation we are getting ready to go through will be for this short term solution that was approved at the directors meeting.     

May. 18, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

Perhaps a future solution is to engage ListHub and Point 2 to make these franchisors destinations for the brokers to select for syndication. Is anyone on the MLS Committee for 2011?

May. 18, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

My (tentative) solution:

1. MLS adopts the following means of gathering broker opt-ins: Any participant wishing her listings to go to a franchisor must write the name of the franchisor on a shard of clay pottery and drop it through the mail slot at the MLS's office.

2. MLS provides a data feed to any franchisor requesting it, including only those listings identified on the aforementioned shards of pottery, and charging a fee sufficient to cover all the MLS's costs for this ridiculous mandate.

3. MLS writes a formal letter to NAR requesting that it devolve its MLS policy-making power to the local MLSs.

-Brian

May. 18, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

Many of us have communicated directly with NAR and I hope that they will email or post their actual interpretation for all of us impacted.  That 30 day time clock is clicking away and we have put a halt on our plans - thanks Matt for making sure of the intent and sharing with us.

The opt-in should be blanket, not selective, with the understanding that the franchisees listings would likely go there.  My head is spinning just trying to grasp how MFR will contact 8,000 brokers, keep track of the opt ins based on the Participant's selections, notify or provide a look up tool to Franchisors, notify the Participants again when a new Franchisor site comes on..........  and somehow expect our brokers that did not opt in to police their listings on a franchisor site? 

I wonder what the liability is for the MLS that is not aware of a Franchisor site, and doesn't notify the Brokers that they can opt in?

Is sending an email to a Franchisor with each broker that opted in the end of our responsibility?  Or do we have to police each site to be sure that they don't publish listings of brokers that did not opt in?

Will the Franchisors want to go to our Participants directly and ask them to submit their listings if the Participant did not opt in?

I'll stop there...(but I could go on :-) )

I wonder why our syndication partners don't get in touch with the Franchisors and set up a channel that our brokers can simply opt into if they want their listings on that site.  In this scenario, the filter of the opt-ins would happen via the channel feed.  All we would need to do is let our Participants know how to opt in. 

Is that too simple?  Probably, but at first glance, makes a lot of sense to me - leaves the opt in for Participants through a dashboard, no paper tracking needed, no MLS notification if a new channel comes along...... 

Just thinking out loud -- and again, thanks to Matt for getting the word out! and for the thoughts and ideas from everyone.

May. 18, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

Matt, as I understood the motion it was explained to me this only applies to "indexing" and not to linking of/to a franchise brokers IDX site. So if a broker does not opt in the franchise web site can still display non franchise listings by linking. Is that correct? or does this clarification mean no display whatsoever?  

May. 18, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

Ron, my understanding is that the old method of linking could still be available to the franchise - but in the past this caused quite the end-user usability issue, which is why the franchises pushed for the ability to have the listings on a single unified site. Of course, indexing and deep-linking into other sites have caused various legal battles - I don't want to go down that rabbit hole too deeply here.

Merri Jo (and others) - I know that blanket would be easier than individual - but that's the heart of the independent broker's issue, that they are being restricted from making choices they should control via policy. My personal feeling - this whole subject should be stripped from IDX and become a syndication issue, just like all other choices regarding what non-participant sites listings should go to. But that's not the hand we've been dealt, and it's not productive to focus on what might have been. I expect that some of my clients might be able to leverage syndication infratructure to deal with opt-ins. Again, it's more complex than syndication at present because most MLSs don't send listings directly to franchises - how do we coordinate opt ins with franchises that get listings a variety of ways?  I've seen a few ideas in the comments here so far, but we have thinking left to do, I think. And fast.

May. 18, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

Not to get ahead of myself- but that is exactly why we built reDataVault- to handle this kind of situation. Within our system, the MLS or LPSREG sets up a syndication (or franchise feed)- The MLS offers it to their Brokers as an "opt-i n" or opt-out" program-and the Brokers are notified of the new offering and go in and either opt-in or opt-out. Each franchise feed is controlled/managed separately and has their own license setup with the MLS. and the rest is managed by our backend- with full transparency and reporting. Thus, keeping track of 10,000 Brokers who opt-in or opt-out and constantly change their minds becomes an automated process operated by the MLS over an MLS branded website.

May. 18, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

May. 18, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

Dennis - good thoughts. As I said earlier, "I'm pretty sure it was not the intent of the NAR Board of Directors that MLSs would need to reprogram their systems to accommodate the participant opt-in." But MLSs need to evaluate what they want to do, if anything, to help facilitate their customers' (brokers') needs relating to opt-in. This might involve that aforementioned reprogramming and/or working with a third party that has the infrastructure needed. Or, as I mentioned earlier, more of a manual process. I know, such a lot of work for might be a state of affairs that only lasts five months!

May. 18, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

Thank you for this very informative dialogue. I too understand the issue it is all about “indexing.”

If the policy stated that MLSs were required to create an IDX feed/syndication channel for franchisers filtered by broker options, I believe the task would be difficult, but not nearly so daunting.

May. 18, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

Shelley, I think I can speak to the first question - at least one possible solution. If the franchiser indexes a broker website, they need to know which listings can be displayed on their site, so they will need to have a list of opted in listings - some type of identifier they can match up to what they have indexed - I'm assuming MLS number and/or address and unit number - and then they would know not to display any other listings. Terribly inefficient. Much better if they just got out of the IDX/indexing game and got a syndication feed like any other non-participant. As you say, that would not be so daunting.

I'm not sure the Franchiser Y/N idea would work, because a participant may wish to opt in to a specific franchise site or sites (or all of them, blanket).

As for enforcement, that is unclear - a matter for attorneys.

May. 20, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

Any updates on this?  What are MLSs doing?  We have the ability in our flexmls System to add opt-ins for specific data feeds but I have many of the same practicality questions as those who have commented above.

First, will any of the franchises actually use such a feed even if it is provided?  My thinking is that the feeds will largely be empty and so they won't use the feeds and will just revert back to their prior IDX strategy.

Second, is it necessary to provide an opt-in for franchise sites that haven't even requested data? 

Lastly, won't all this change in a few months anyway and so, is the best advice to MLSs simply to wait and see?  What is the downside to that approach?

May. 20, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

Great questions, Mike.  It's not clear if this will change in November or not.  The independent broker neteworks told me they insisted on opt-in as a "minimum" concession - but everyone knows that is not the final answer.

Jun. 15, 2011 - RE: Critical Clarifications of the NAR IDX/Franchise Rule

Well, June 13 has come and gone, looking at RE/MAX International as a benchmark, I see listings have disappeared from my market except for those from the local RE/MAX offices.

I hosted a webinar, inviting all my 200+/- participating brokers, 21 signed up. So far I have 13 that have responded to Opt-In and no mechanism to transmit these results to the franchisors.

My new favorite quote is from the movie "Madagascar," as the penguins sit on the beach, "... Just smile and wave boys, smile and wave."