You wrote:

“A couple of horses the DOJ should be riding:
1) Why can’t a FSBO advertise in Homes and Land or Harmon Homes or The Real Estate Magazine?
2) Why do some companies not allow a buyer to negotiate the fee when they meet with an agent to sign a buyer agent agreement, the same way a seller negotiates the fee when they sign a listing agreement?
3) Why do some companies have a policy that the agents can’t negotiate the fee lower than x, when the company itself gains nothing from said policy in its profit base?”

Anti-trust violations generally include concerted action and/or market power. As to all three of your examples, you are dealing with independent companies who are making indepedent business decisions. Further, of the ones you mentioned, none individually are going to have the type of market power where independent action will “unreasonably” (key word) restrain trade.

There is a big difference when business action is taken by an MLS which is operated by a local industry trade association which is governed by a national trade association who determines the policies that the MLS will be run under.

So the DOJ really can’t ride the horses you mentioned.

-Russ

For the most part bottom feeder sites affect buyers and not sellers. But in either case, if the agent is willing to give x dollars to the bottom feeder then the agent would be willing to reduce the fee to the consumer, buyer or seller consumer, by the same x dollars. I think consumers would rather have it, or at least KNOW about the exchange of monies. The seller is paying it, the buyer is financing it, so how come they don’t know about it? Doesn’t show anywhere, not traceable.

The only HARM and FOUL is that the bottom feeder does not DISCLOSE this monetary exchange in any way to the consumer, nor does the agent.

Lack of disclosure is never the right way to go. The consumer should have the choice of how they spend their money. In real estate all of these dollars come from the consumer, somehow, by the end of the day.

Is the bottomfeeder site taking commission money away from the listing broker or inhibiting the sale?

If not, no harm, no foul.

If so, sue for God’s sake and let’s get this thing decided. Just complaining about bottomfeeders is a waste of time.

BTW, buyers do not care a whit who points them to the house–so long as they see ALL the houses—this means widest dissemination of listing facts. Control of listing facts hurts buyers. It requires them to become a lead to see the listing.. Using listings to get leads—hmm, I dont recall that as part of fiduciary duty to seller or code of ethics.

Bottom line–if house gets sold and listing broker gets his/her commission, there is nothing to complain about.

Why would a buyer want to shoot himself in the foot by going to a lead generation site, if there is incentive for him to go to a Broker Direct site. Compete fairly by giving the buyer a reason to choose you, not with rules to block fair trade.

The horse sellers want to ride:

“Widespread Dissemination” , i.e. advertisie my listing all over the place, let it be spread throughout the internet, do not restrict the listing & do not let anyone tell my broker where he or she can advertise my property. I have to sell darn it! (MLS keep your rope off my horse)

The right tracks:

More than just on the MLS & broker site–i.e running free in print & other internet sites so that my horse can be seen by as many buyers as possible. Run housie run!

Only fair payout for a winner: Commission to the listing broker. So long as this payout occurs, no one should have any objections that this occurred because someone else used (spidered) the listing facts & disseminated them to the consumer w/o asking or getting a cut of the commish pie.

Problem caused by controlling listing facts & allowing joint ownership w/ MLS by copyright (the worst way to corral the listing horse) is that it puts mud on the tracks and cripples the horse.

Controlling the data via copyright ,and the “opt out” provision, are miniscule components to the “big picture”.

The “right track” is giving buyer consumers the same power as seller consumers in contract and fee negotiation. The “right track” is opening all options available to consumers, both buyer and seller consumers, without restraint of trade.

Of the horses available to ride to that finish line, wherein the consumer has as many options in the real estate markets as they do in other markets, are many. Copyright and opt out provisions, are not necessarily the horses that will get the consumer over the finish line, to true, open market conditions.

Just my $.02 YMMV