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As the real estate industry continues to grapple with how to handle confidential listings, a document Inman obtained reveals that Anywhere is seeking changes that would loosen NAR’s Clear Partnership Policy.
Meanwhile, Compass on Thursday reiterated its call for change and promised to help many listing services that do not use the law.
The Anywhere documents include a letter and an email, mostly containing the same text, from Caitlin McCrory, the company’s vice president and head of industry relations. In the documents, McCrory says “NAR should have fewer mandatory rules and loosen restrictions on MLSs and industry participants.” He also says that Clear Cooperation “can be unduly restrictive.”
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Finally McCrory goes on to ask that the National Association of Realtors consider two things: First, the elimination of “restrictions on the merging of MLS and non-MLS listings, or as an optional rule”; and second, the rollback of the “Clear Partnership Act so that sellers, agents, and other providers have a wider range of marketing options and services.”
NAR adopted Clear Cooperation in 2019 in an effort to reduce the “pack list,” or list that is not advertised or available to the general public. The law requires agents to upload listings to their NAR-affiliated MLS within one day of marketing those listings.
However, McCrory argues in the Anywhere documents that he favors restoring the one-day requirement to a longer period that “lasts at least a few weeks.” He’s also floated, among other suggestions, the idea of ”reducing the requirement that 100 percent of listings be listed in the MLS.”
Either declined to comment on the documents when reached Thursday by Inman. The email is dated September 17, 2024. The letter is undated.
In pursuing reform, the company joins other organizations such as Compass and The Agency that are also putting pressure on NAR for Clear Cooperation. Both Compass CEO Robert Reffkin and The Agency’s CEO Mauricio Umansky called for an end to the law. Either way it doesn’t go that far, asking NAR instead to loosen the policy and give industry members more flexibility.
However, the complaint that Clear Cooperation is overly restrictive and that it should be a “consumer choice”—a term McCrory uses in his book—often underpins calls for NAR to take action on the issue.
Reffkin, in particular, has been vocal about Clear Cooperation and on Thursday again called for change in an Instagram post. Among other things, he argued with the post that “Clearly Partnerships are removed, MLSs will need to win” the business of agents and buyers.
“This will lead to MLSs needing to ask agents and landlords what they can do to make the MLS a better place to list,” Reffkin continued. “Homeowners will ask for options to reduce the risk of MLS exposure – no days on market, no history of price declines, no price, no address, no sales aggregators removing buyer inquiries from their listing agents – all features that Compass Private Exclusives provides. to provide based on the host’s response.”
Reffkin also pledged in an Instagram post that he would support MLSs that do not enforce clear contracts. That support will include data feeds for Compass listings, he said, and requests for other brokerages to provide similar data feeds. Compass will also help multiple listing services “expand into other markets where MLSs enforce clear interoperability.”
Asked Thursday about Anywhere’s proposal to change Clear Cooperation, Reffkin said “while I would favor a policy that would replace the one-day listing requirement with 60 days as the DOJ has publicly asked NAR to do, I support Anywhere’s recommendation to move it ‘at least’ a few weeks.’”
Reffkin’s reference to the DOJ refers to a letter dated July 29, 2020, from a US Department of Justice attorney to an attorney representing NAR. In the letter, the DOJ attorney proposes two changes to the Clear Partnership rule: extending “from one business day to sixty days the period during which listing sellers must submit listings to the MLS”; and eliminating “exceptions to the Clear Partnership Policy for ‘office exclusivity.’”
Reffkin also told Inman that he applauds “Anywhere for standing up for homeowner’s rights.”
Clear Cooperation has recently become one of the most talked about issues in the real estate industry. Earlier this month, NAR’s MLS Technology and Emerging Issues Advisory Board took the legislation under consideration during a meeting.
McCrory’s letter outlining Nomaphi’s views on Clear Cooperation was addressed to members of that board.
In an email to Inman on Wednesday, NAR said board members at the meeting “weighed a wide range of perspectives including buyers, sellers, and real estate professionals, as well as fair housing principles, as they consider how best to meet these growing stakeholder needs.”
However, no action has been taken yet.
It remains to be seen what NAR can do. But it’s already clear that exclusive listings are increasingly becoming a real estate battleground. Earlier this week, for example, Side announced that it would be rolling out its private list network. Compass, too, has popular lists available only through its “Private Exclusives” program.
Other companies, including Howard Hanna, Opendoor and more, also have programs that offer exclusive listings that are only available through agents or their sites. Such networks avoid dealing with Clear Cooperation by doing “office exclusive” listings, or listings developed only within real estate companies – which is allowed under the law. But the proliferation of such networks suggests a growing interest in other parts of the industry in the use of listings not available through MLSs.
Email Jim Dalrymple II
