Punishing Chris Fountain?

Greenwich brokers have all been switched to a new listing access system, “flexMLS”, but did we really need to do this?

If you’re presently working with a Greenwich broker, you’ll have noticed a change in the e-mailed listings the broker sends you. If you can even view them, the e-mailed listings are now harder to decipher, harder to open, and generally less informative. The reason is, the Greenwich Association of Realtors decided to switch all of us to something new called “flexMLS“.

That link back there brings you to the sign-in page we brokers must use to enter this new site, and it is hideous. That’s not just me talking, that’s the verdict of 90+ Sotheby’s Greenwich brokers, who sounded off recently in a long string of frustration-filled e-mails sent back and forth to each other. Everyone hates the new system, particularly our clients!

And that’s the worst part. If our clients liked it, we’d put up with the needless complexity and non-intuitiveness of this new program, but if the client ain’t happy, we ain’t happy. So why did we switch? We were told that the old system was being “phased out”, and would  “no longer be supported by the provider”.

I went along with this excuse until rumors surfaced that Darien brokers were continuing to use the old system. How can this be, I asked myself? So yesterday, I drove up to Darien and visited a few real estate offices and spoke to a few managers, and guess what? The old system, called “CoreLogic MLS” is not being phased out, and it is continuing to be supported!

So what’s this all about? Well, one possibility is that it was a plot to thwart Chris Fountain’s blog. You see, the new system doesn’t allow you to send or attach listing links. Instead, our clients must sign in to something called a “portal”, where they can (theoretically) access listings, but guess what? They aren’t doing it! Not one of my clients has been willing to go through the laborious process of signing in to one these stupid things.

So yes, we’ve succeeded in preventing Chris Fountain from using his blog to link to Greenwich real estate listings, hooray! But we’ve destroyed our capability to communicate with our clients, not-so hooray!

8 Bradbury Place, On Market 10 Minutes, Now Has Deal

8 Bradbury Place, Riverside, CT Ask: $2,850,000.

What’s remarkable about this one is how long it took the last time it was on the market. Back then, September 26, 2005, to be exact, a hopeful “spec” builder brought this perfectly nice, brand new house on the market for $3,295,000.

And then….nothing happened.  It sat there, un-loved, un-wanted for…for…lemmie do the math….for 940 days (with maybe a year and a half off for good behavior), something like that.

That was a L-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-N-G time. This time?  A week, and done.

8 Bradbury Place, comes on for $25,000 less than paid in 2008, sells instantly!

What Happened Last Week?

In the week January 28-Feb. 1, 2013, here’s what got reported by the MLS:

11 properties closed, priced $475,000-6,999,000.

19 properties got accepted-offers, priced $349,000-5,299,000.

No matter how you look at it, that’s a busy week.  And judging by this past weekend, things are getting hotter still.

Watch this space.

11 Broad Road, on the “Belle Haven peninsula” *, $5.299M,  got a deal last week.                                                                                   *Aka, not quite in Belle Haven, but darned close.