One feature of the soon to launch OpenBrix property portal is their MLS function, or Multiple Listing Service, and it’s a benefit that Adam Pigott and his team are unashamedly pushing. 

Why? Well simply because it works to help all parties in the property market – not just the seller or the buyer or the agent - but all of them.

An MLS is a database or network established by estate agents to share details on current property stock listed for sale or let. It essentially allows member estate agents to see what stock other estate agents have on their books with the wider goal of connecting buyers and sellers.

It has become the norm in the US and Canada and allows agents to offer properties that fit a buyer’s requirements that they may have otherwise been unable to do, with the agents involved choosing how to split the commission of the sale when working together.

OpenBrix has researched MLS data for the Canadian property market, a market that’s similar in many respects to the UK, to ascertain whether agents that use and promote the MLS actually achieve higher prices for their clients. The answer is that they do – by 12%.

OpenBrix says that Canada residential real estate is a market worth $361billion USD in sales (2019). About half the size of the UK but nonetheless the 8th largest in the world (UK $745bn USD).

In July this year, data suggests that the average Canadian house sold at a value of $571,471 CAD. Whereas those that sold via the Canadian MLS system achieved $640,800 CAD - a difference of 12.1%. This analysis was across a sample size of 42,000 transactions.

If this were translated to the UK market it would suggest that agents could achieve £28,591 more for their sellers than the average UK house price of £235,673 (HM Land Reg). And if agents wanted to look at this purely selfishly, that could equate to earning almost £430 more per sale in fees at a typical 1.5%.

As validation of this, leading Canadian real-estate broker Irene Kaushansky of Kaushansky Brown in Toronto offers us this exclusive comment:  “Having not lived in a real estate world without MLS I personally cannot imagine doing business without it. We have over 58,000 realtors in our Toronto Board but whether it's that or 5000, or even 500, no matter how connected you are, there is no other way to know all agents and buyers. The more exposure there is for a property, the more buyers have an opportunity to see it and the greater the potential sale price for our sellers.”

“I'll give you a very current example and it's only because it happened this week.  A property was listed at $1.439m and after one week we had 47 private showing appointments.  On offer day, we received 5 offers. Here’s the thing - the top price from one local agent was $1.6m but the final sale price we achieved was actually $1.675m from one of two agents from outside the area that I didn't even know. While this is just one example to illustrate the above, it gives you an idea of the power of MLS exposure in dollar terms.”

Adam Pigott, CEO of OpenBrix in an untypically brief comment on the matter ads “Using our MLS system on the OpenBrix portal could make agents and their clients more money. The data proves it and it’s plain for agents to see once they start to be open to the power of this concept. Don’t be left behind.”