Realtors Confused by Competing MediaOne Venture
08.25.2009 by Jeff Robinson
(KCPW News) A Utah media company has confounded local real estate agents by getting into the real estate business itself. MediaOne, which handles advertising, circulation and printing for both the Salt Lake Tribune and the Deseret News, has launched a brokerage called MediaOne Real Estate. Ryan Kirkham, President of the Salt Lake Board of Realtors, says he was shocked when he recently learned of this.
“I wish I’d had some dialogue with them before. I wonder why they didn’t decide to sell cars or electronics,” he told KCPW. “I don’t know why real estate, but I guess they felt like real estate was an avenue where they could make some money.”
Kirkham says this puts other local real estate agents in the awkward position of paying one of their competitors to run advertising. He says he’s already heard from agents who plan to pull their ads from the two newspapers, which jointly own MediaOne.
The papers have been struggling with their revenues over the past year, with the Deseret News having to cut staff and the Tribune implementing a hiring freeze. But Kirkham cautions that real estate is not an easy way to make a quick buck.
“A lot of people from the outside look at real estate and they say, gosh, my realtor drives a fancy car, or my realtor sure seems like he or she’s out of town a lot, or my realtor sure wears nice clothes. But I think that looks can be really deceiving, and that sure holds true in real estate,” he said.
In fact, Kirkham estimates that 10 percent of real estate agents sell 80 percent of the properties. MediaOne Real Estate’s website says the company offers a flat fee for selling a home instead of taking a commission.
The plain and simple truth is this: The consumer has more info at their fingertips than ever before. Consumers can search for real estate on various national websites like Realtor.com,Yahoo,Google,etc,etc….They the capability to advertise their real estate all over the internet but they still don’t have the capability to upload their listing to the MLS….Realtors still hold the key and so you will see a multitude of options when it comes listing one’s property on the MLS, but it is important to know that to be listed on the MLS you have to go through a LICENSED BROKER. With that said there are brokers who charge a percentage to list your home and still others that are a hybrid of sorts,…charging a flat rate or up front fee to list and a percentage when the home sells.
Another fact is that the consumer is out to save and is willing to put in some sweat equity in order to help Realtors sell their home. Consumers also realize that it no longer makes sense to mortgage 6% of their homes value to pay a Realtor, and with the $8,000 tax credit being given to first time home buyers why would the consumer give that back to a Realtor.
The Flat Rate real estate platform will continue to gain marketshare because this is what the consumer wants. They are very smart and very internet savvy.