Tennessee-based MLS Realtracs, two months after threatening to join Chicago-based MRED in cutting Zillow off from its listing feed, has entered into a new licensing agreement with the portal, which “ensures uninterrupted listing distribution” while ensuring Realtracs members continue to have access to Zillow tools.
In a statement, Realtracs President and CEO Stuart White said he was “pleased” that Zillow agreed to the licensing agreement, which among other things, requires the portal to notify the MLS if it bans any properties under its rules governing “private” listings.
“Realtracs is committed to the brokers and agents who create the listing content that powers our industry,” White said. “We’re pleased that Zillow has signed our modernized license agreement.”
The dispute goes back to the spring, when Realtracs joined a handful of other MLSs in launching a national platform, with mega-brokerage Compass as a partner.
Subsequently, the MLS threatened to cut Zillow off from its listing feed, citing the same rule that MRED used when it (briefly) carried out that same threat. MRED, Compass and Zillow are currently battling in federal court over those issues.
But Realtracs seemingly has taken a different path. The deadline it gave Zillow passed, with the MLS saying it would not cut Zillow off as negotiations were ongoing.
According to a separate release from Realtracs, the new agreement also “defines approved uses for Realtracs listing data, including AI usage, and “preserves access” to Zillow products including ShowingTime, Follow Up Boss and dotloop. A Zillow spokesperson clarified that “nothing has changed” as part of the new agreement, except to ensure all the tools are “available and effective.”
The MLS added it is still committed to “marketing flexibility,” including exclusive listings.
“Once a property is publicly marketed, we believe it should be broadly available to real estate professionals and consumers,” the MLS wrote.
Additionally, Zillow will now simultaneously notify Realtracs if it warns or bans a listing that violates its rules, which Realtracs says “provides greater transparency into those situations.”
Zillow did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The portal has accused Compass of pressuring multiple MLSs to cut it off as part of a broader dispute over private listings, and court documents have shown that Compass urged MLSs to “enforce” a specific rule against Zillow, in exchange for favorable treatment.
In one of those exchanges that came up during a recent hearing in the MRED case, Compass CEO Robert Reffkin railed against Bright MLS when it declined to enforce those rules, saying in an email back in the spring that “all the MLSs except MRED and Realtracs have completely sold us out.”
In his statement, White said the deal with Zillow is about making sure his MLS can “provide complete and accurate information” as well as “give sellers the ability to choose how broadly a listing is marketed.”
The Zillow agreement “furthers those guiding principles by establishing clearly defined use rights, responsible use standards, and stronger protections for broker-created data while preserving sellers’ ability to reach the broad audience they expect when marketing their homes,” he claimed.
This is a developing story. Stay tuned to RISMedia for updates.
