MLS growth adds steam to market
BY ALLEN NORWOOD
Commentary

Charlotte-area home sales hit a record high last year. Impressive, and vital to the economy. And, increasingly, a key ingredient in the housing market's health is the expansion of the Multiple Listing Services.

Consider:

• Last week, 17,431 single-family homes were listed by the Carolina Multiple Listing Services, the agency that lists properties for sale in Mecklenburg and surrounding counties. But fewer than half -- just 7,885 -- were in Mecklenburg.

• The MLS grew by about 20 percent last year, and now has almost 6,000 member agents and brokers who contribute listings for prospective home buyers. That reflects a trend across the country, according to the National Association of Realtors. The number of listing services is shrinking, as burgeoning metro services sprawl to absorb or overlap smaller suburban or rural organizations.

• There's no boundary to the reach of the MLS. It's a membership organization that can grow outward as long as Realtors in suburban counties see value in joining. And technology coming Aug. 1 will make it even easier for distant Realtors to join and use the system.

Tony Smith, president of the Charlotte Regional Realtor Association and an architect of the MLS, thinks the technology will speed the expansion of a system that already stretches out 50 or 60 miles.

"The growth is staggering," he said. "Our boundaries have grown tremendously. ... And as we make more information available to more people, we're going to list and sell property that we wouldn't have before."

Smith and others say the public has many misconceptions about the MLS.

For instance, it's not the same as the Charlotte Regional Realtor Association. Not all members of the association are MLS members; many MLS members belong to suburban boards of Realtors instead of the regional association.

The official core counties of the MLS are Mecklenburg, Cabarrus, Gaston, Iredell, Lincoln, Stanly and Union.

"That means the Realtors in those areas have picked us as their MLS," said Steve Byrd, vice president of the listing service. Homes they list for sale are shared and marketed together.

Iredell Realtors chose to become an official part of the regional association, said Anne Marie Howard, CEO of the association. In Gaston, on the other hand, Realtors maintained their county association.

Union was added to the MLS in 1989, Lincoln in '91 and Gaston in '94. In some cases, the changes sparked infighting, Howard said, but most has subsided. "Now, people are wanting to join us, versus feeling like they have to join us."

In Charlotte and across the country, suburban real estate salespeople are drawn to large MLS systems because of cost and technology -- and in many cases, the cost of technology.

More than half of home buyers today begin their searches online. In order to be successful, agents must be plugged into vast online networks.

As the technology gets more sophisticated and expensive, smaller MLS systems find it more difficult to provide high levels of service. Even when local listings are online, agents can be part of much larger metro networks for about the same fees.

In Salisbury, Jeff Smith of Glover Realty is a member of the Charlotte and Rowan County MLS systems.

"I see a real benefit to being in both," he said.

He remains a member of the Charlotte MLS, not to sell homes to Charlotteans, but for the national exposure. Someone in California thinking of relocating to this area, for instance, is most likely to begin his search by typing in "Charlotte."

"Who's going to type in `Salisbury' if he doesn't know North Carolina?" Smith asks. An online search of Charlotte-area home listings would include Smith's listings from Rowan County.

Smith, who's president of the Rowan Association of Realtors, estimates 40 percent of his Rowan colleagues are also members of the regional MLS.

In Shelby, Jane Ross of Coldwell Banker Horn & Associates is a member of the regional and local MLS systems.

She joined Carolina Multiple Listing Services primarily to market her listings to Charlotte agents whose clients might be interested in Cleveland County.

"More and more people are looking for areas like we have here," she said, "and (reaching other agents) is the best way to secure a qualified buyer."

Ross said the local MLS costs agents about the same as the regional MLS. She estimated that 10 percent of Cleveland agents are members of both.

On Aug. 1, Carolina Multiple Listing Services will convert to a Web-page system. Byrd and others say home shoppers won't notice much difference, but the change will be important to real estate salespeople, especially those in distant offices.

Now, the online MLS requires special software. Users must install the software and undergo training. That means trips to Charlotte. After the change, salespeople will be able to go straight to the Web page.

"We hope that next August we are going to pick up more members from those outlying areas," Byrd said. "Anyone anywhere could join us and use this system just like anyone else."