Zillow will get a direct listing feed from Bay Area Real Estate Information Services Inc. (BAREIS), a Santa Rosa, Calif.-based multiple listing service (MLS), in exchange for enhanced member broker and agent branding on the portal and other perks.
The 7,500-member BAREIS joins the Houston Association of Realtors (HAR); Connecticut Multiple Listing Service (CTMLS); Shrewsbury, Mass.-based MLS Property Information Network Inc. (MLSPIN); Corpus Christi Association of Realtors (CCAR), which joined in March; and others as members of the Zillow Partnership Platform, which the portal introduced last year.
“It makes perfect sense that we would work with Zillow to make sure the listings of our sellers, agents and brokers are as up to date and accurate as we can possibly make them,” said BAREIS CEO Jim Branscombe, in a statement. BAREIS serves five counties north of San Francisco — Marin, Mendocino, Napa, Solano and Sonoma — in a largely agricultural area known for its vineyards.
Zillow, like its rival Trulia, in some markets has dated and inaccurate listings because some of them come from a variety of places, including brokers, agents and other sources, and not directly from MLSs.
The direct feed to the Zillow Real Estate Network, which includes Zillow.com, Yahoo Homes, Google Now, HGTV’s FrontDoor and HotPads, is updated as often as every 15 minutes.
“The Zillow Partnership Platform strives to eliminate the confusion associated with stale data, lagging price changes and incorrect statuses,” said Bob Bemis, Zillow vice president of partner relations, in a statement.
Trulia launched a program in 2011 in which MLS data takes precedence over other sources when discrepancies are found. Large MLSs providing Trulia with direct feeds include HAR, MLSPIN, CTMLS, Midwest Real Estate Data LLC (MRED), and Bay Area Real Estate Information Services Inc. (BAREIS) in the San Francisco Bay Area.
