Saturday, December 09, 2006

Inventory of Homes For Sale

As a homebuyer what are the most popular web sites to find homes for sale? I just thumbed through the 2006 Realtor Technology Survey, conducted by NAR's Center for REALTOR Technology in May 2006 - I remembered a graph and posted it below.


Obviously, the survey is dated but it shows that Agents place the majority of their listings with a local MLS site, the brokers site, Realtor.com and their own site.

"The fact is that buyers buy from the available inventory:" Gregg Swann

The MLS is an inventory. It is not universal, and a huge number of homes sold are not MLS-listed. Craigslist has an inventory. Zillow will have an inventory. Having a fairly comprehensive inventory is important to Realtors, but...

...The fact is, although there might be 45,000 homes in the Arizona Regional Multiple Listings Service right now, when I go out to show houses, I will have (those) listings with me... When buyers are ready to buy, they will buy from whatever inventory is available from the vendor they have decided to buy from. If they are convinced FSBOs are a bargain, the 29 houses on Craigslist just trumped my 45,000.

1 comment:

Open House said...

If this is a First-Time homebuyer and decided to "trump" the MLS listings and make an offer on the property For Sale By Owner - What happens now?

A homebuyer would most likely have some questions.

Will the Seller know how to handle the transactional requirements?

A normal part of the home sale process involves an inspection of the home by a licensed professional, called a disclosure package. This is used by the prospective purchaser to become aware of any problems with the house and/or maintenance needs.

What if there is no such disclosure package available?

Working with a Realtor would the homebuyer get advised to write an offer contingent on acceptable inspections? (Is the homebuyer working with a discount broker or full service broker.) This might be the better question.

Who pays for the inspections? <--- It's all negotable, and its a slow market.

What forms will be used to negotiate the transaction?