Eau Claire MLS bans the phrase “Search MLS”
Recently, the powers that be of the Northwest Wisconsin Association of Realtors Multiple Listing Service (hereinafter referred to as Eau Claire MLS) headquarters in Eau Claire, Wisconsin decided that real estate agent websites can no longer contain the phrase Search in MLS.
MLS, of course, stands for Multiple Listing Service and refers to the practice of offering commissions to other real estate agents if they bring a buyer to a seller or seller’s agent. I believe this change is hurting the general public immediately and will hurt real estate agents and brokers in the long run.
The justification for this rule change was as follows:
The use of the term MLS gives consumers the impression that they have access to the MLS, when in fact they have access to a very limited amount of information in the MLS, which should lead them to call a real estate agent for assistance. .
First of all… Huh?
Eau Claire real estate consumers DO have access to the Eau Claire MLS. The so-called justification above even says so: have access to a very limited amount of information on the MLS. Most residents understand that when they want to view property listings for sale, they can access any Eau Claire MLS-enabled real estate website and view listings from all partner companies through Eau Claire MLS.
To say that people “don’t have access” to Eau Claire MLS just because they don’t have access to 100% of the data it contains is ridiculous. It is splitting semantic hairs and playing childish games with language. To illustrate this lack of logic, let’s make an analogy using television. Let’s say you don’t have cable TV, you just wear bunny ears. What the board is telling you, using its own logic, is that you don’t have access to ANY TV stations because you don’t have ALL the channels. Or that you don’t really have access to ANY library because your local library doesn’t have ALL the books in print. The logic is flawed.
It is mls a generic term?
The reason the rule was enacted was to help prevent the term mls from becoming a generic term like Xerox, Kleenex, or Frisbee. The difference between these examples and Eau Claire MLS Prayed Search MLS is that no organization of real estate agents owns the registered trademark in the term mls. The term mark mls, in fact, is in the hands of Major League Soccer. So it could be argued that mls is already a generic term, especially since it does not exist at the national level mls. When people talk about listing on the Eau Claire MLS, they are referring to the MLS for the general geographic area in which they reside. To further complicate matters, sometimes these geographic areas overlap, and sometimes properties are listed on more than one MLS.
It hurts consumers
I believe this decision is having an immediate negative impact on the general public in Eau Claire. The general public already knows that Eau Claire MLS is the database that contains a ton of listings from many different agents and companies. All the other suggestions provided (“Search Area Properties”, “Search Local Listings”, “Search Northwest WI Properties”) are all clunky by comparison. Search MLS it is succinct and precise.
Harms real estate agents
Perhaps the funniest thing about this decision is that it will hurt real estate agents and brokers in the future. How, you ask?
Well, this rule only applies to real estate agents. Since the term mls is not a trademark of any Multiple Listing Service, what will prevent Zillow.com or Trulia.com from placing links on their site indicating that people can search the Eau Claire MLS? In fact, what will stop ANY site not run by a real estate agent from filling their site with MLS related anchor text only to have them outbid all the local real estate websites when people inevitably search for the Eau Claire MLS? I have no doubt that the sites will collect these sales leads and sell them to real estate agents. Real estate agents who, by virtue of this brilliant rule, cannot compete with these parasitic sites.
Long story short: This new rule banning the phrase “Search MLS” makes things more confusing for the consumer looking for homes. It makes Realtor websites more clunky and detailed. And it creates a giant loophole that will be exploited by websites looking to eat real estate agent lunches.