Moving to Chicago?  Maybe parts of Indiana, Iowa and Wisconsin?  Last week thousands of Zillow listings disappeared on that website. Why? Well, the 411 is simple-there’s a battle going on across the country between MLS services and in this case it’s between Zillow and Chi-town’s real estate database called MRED. The database cut off 43,000 listings claiming that Zillow violated its agreement in regard to a new trend of some listings not being advertised on the platform but instead kept from the internet for weeks before you can hear about or see them.

Zillow (and me as well) believe that if a seller wants the best marketing and the most eyes on a property, you go ‘full MLS’ so that millions see the listing. Compass Real Estate owns Better Homes and Gardens Real Estate, Century 21, Colwell Banker, Corcoran, ERA, Sotheby’s International Realty and Christie’s International Real Estate with about 340,000 real estate agents under their umbrella. Zillow sued MRED and Compass earlier this month stating that those two entities conspired to cut off Zillow’s access to Chicago-area listings.

Holding listings off the MLS is happening here. I just did a search in the Wasatch Front MLS and there were ten of them, most of which were in the Park City area. These look a lot like pocket or limited access listings to me but some and for the consumer you must be working with one of these firms to see the full listing. I have a buyer that found one of these in the Sugar House area listed by a local real estate firm and it wasn’t on the MLS. I was able to show it to her with a bit of research and a week later it appeared on the MLS.

What’s the advantage? First, a buyer might find less competition for a property if the world (internet) doesn’t know about it. Real estate companies can lure in buyers if their listings are private to that firm only. Second, a buyer can get early access before other buyers know about the home.  For sellers, some may not want the world to see the property because of a divorce or estate sale situation or they are relatively famous. Others may want to ‘test’ the market through extremely limited marketing to see if anyone bites at a price. Sadly, many sellers still believe in ‘Covid pricing’-listing higher than comparables, which can lead to a long, long time on the market.

According to effectiveagents.com, the reality is that off-market homes often sell for less than list-about 17% less than comparable public MLS listings which certainly benefits buyers but not sellers. If it were me selling a home, I’d want a ‘limited or non-public’ listing broker to charge me a lot less commission for less service. I’d want the seller to handle showings, negotiations and even paperwork with a clear understanding of the limits of this kind of marketing.