The largest multiple listing service in the Sunshine State is set to be the first to launch a new MLS offering from property data and analytics firm Remine.
Orlando-based My Florida Regional MLS (MFRMLS) boasts more than 58,000 real estate agent and broker subscribers in central and southwest Florida and Puerto Rico, all of whom will be able to access all of Remine’s tools at no additional charge except for those in Puerto Rico due to a lack of historical MLS and public records data.
In early May, MFRMLS will be the first to launch Remine Enterprise Pro, which allows MLSs to give all their agents access to Remine’s entire suite of services. Those services include map-based, public records-enhanced property searches, a comparative market analysis (CMA) tool that incorporates both MLS and off-market properties, a customer relationship management (CRM) system that doesn’t require agents to enter data themselves, chat and collaboration tools for consumers and their agents, a scoring system that predicts the likelihood that someone will sell, integrated marketing for up to 10,000 properties, and a mobile app, among other features.
Merri Jo Cowen
“We are very excited to bring the Pro version of Remine to our market. MFRMLS customers will have every Remine function included as a member benefit to equip them with the most modern data and marketing tools available. We want to keep them in the center of the transaction in today’s competitive technology landscape,” said Merri Jo Cowen, MFRMLS’s CEO, in a statement.
The offering follows Remine’s decision last month to shift its business model to focus on selling services to entire MLSs, rather than trying to “up sell” individual agents. The shift resulted in layoffs for two-thirds of Remine’s sales staff and came about a month after the company announced that it had raised $30 million in a series A funding round. Remine said at the time that it would use the funding to roll out an “MLS 2.0” platform later this year. The product will put the company more directly in competition with industry heavyweights CoreLogic and Black Knight.
After Remine’s MLS 2.0 announcement in February, Michael Wurzer, president of MLS system vendor FBS, contended in a blog post that Remine was more focused on upselling its lead prospecting products to agents than creating an innovative MLS system. In an interview with Inman, Mark Schacknies, CFO and co-founder of Remine, defended the model and said, “We believe that it’s part of our value-add to the MLS to provide them with flexibility.”
When announcing the shift in March, Schacknies said it came at the request of MLSs who wanted broader, more comprehensive options. He also said the ability to upgrade for agents whose MLSs do not subscribe to the new offering is “not completely done,” but that it’s being de-emphasized.
Remine’s platform is live in 45 MLSs with 900,000 real estate agents combined, according to the company. In a statement, Remine President Leo Pareja praised MFRMLS as one of the “most forward-thinking MLSs in the country.” In August, MFRMLS launched the first Spanish-language MLS in the U.S. and later added Puerto Rico to its service area.
The 500 or so members of the Puerto Rico Association of Realtors will not be able to use Remine’s offering — not because MFRMLS doesn’t want to provide it, but because “there is simply no data available there, at least not yet. No public records, etc.,” Cowen told Inman via email.
Back when the Puerto Rico Association of Realtors joined MFRMLS in October, Cowen noted that PRAR’s current and historical MLS data would not be contributed to MFRMLS and PRAR would be building its database “from the ground up, with participants and subscribers manually entering their current and pending inventory directly into MFR’s Matrix system.” She declined to discuss PRAR’s previous vendor at the time.
Editor’s note: This story has been updated to clarify that MFRMLS’s members in Puerto Rico will not be able to use the new Remine offering.
