![MLS Insight: RMLS™ Scores RESO Data Dictionary Certification]()
by Gail Hare | Aug 27, 2015 | Industry News, RMLSweb
MLS Insight is a series about how things work at RMLS™.
RMLS™ is now the fifth MLS in the nation to be certified on the RESO Data Dictionary.
Yes, I’m yelling—because this is a major accomplishment, and it’s very hard to convey how much of an achievement it is because so many of the terms have to be defined. It’s not like saying we won the World Series or the Preakness or sold the most real estate, which most people would immediately understand and relate to.
- RESO is the data standards organization for real estate, whose mission is the standardization of both the process and real estate data that is shared throughout the industry.
- The Data Dictionary provides a common standard that defines real estate data in consistent terms and data structures across hundreds of MLSs, so that data can be more readily shared and understood.
- NAR requires that all affiliated MLSs adopt the RESO Data Dictionary January 1, 2016.
Kim Hutchinson, RMLS™ Data Quality Technician, worked for many hours to analyze and map RMLS™ data to the RESO Data Dictionary 1.3, making sure that there was congruence without compromising the accepted meaning of the data collected and to make changes under the hood to conform with data length and type requirements.
Our Distribution Services staff has begun the process of reaching out to providers of services and products to our real estate community to let them know that the Data Dictionary filters are available for RETS feeds. We expect this will expand the availability of cost-competitive products useful to our subscribers in the future. The idea is that using a common standard will foster innovation and help to create more of a “plug-and-play” environment, where REALTORS® will be able to purchase software and use it with data from any MLS operating on the RESO standards.
I deferred my planned post focusing on our Training Department to share this news. If you have questions on any RMLS™-related topic that you would like to have answered, I encourage you to post a comment.
![MLS Insight: RMLS™ Scores RESO Data Dictionary Certification]()
by Gail Hare | Aug 27, 2015 | Industry News, RMLSweb
MLS Insight is a series about how things work at RMLS™.
RMLS™ is now the fifth MLS in the nation to be certified on the RESO Data Dictionary.
Yes, I’m yelling—because this is a major accomplishment, and it’s very hard to convey how much of an achievement it is because so many of the terms have to be defined. It’s not like saying we won the World Series or the Preakness or sold the most real estate, which most people would immediately understand and relate to.
- RESO is the data standards organization for real estate, whose mission is the standardization of both the process and real estate data that is shared throughout the industry.
- The Data Dictionary provides a common standard that defines real estate data in consistent terms and data structures across hundreds of MLSs, so that data can be more readily shared and understood.
- NAR requires that all affiliated MLSs adopt the RESO Data Dictionary January 1, 2016.
Kim Hutchinson, RMLS™ Data Quality Technician, worked for many hours to analyze and map RMLS™ data to the RESO Data Dictionary 1.3, making sure that there was congruence without compromising the accepted meaning of the data collected and to make changes under the hood to conform with data length and type requirements.
Our Distribution Services staff has begun the process of reaching out to providers of services and products to our real estate community to let them know that the Data Dictionary filters are available for RETS feeds. We expect this will expand the availability of cost-competitive products useful to our subscribers in the future. The idea is that using a common standard will foster innovation and help to create more of a “plug-and-play” environment, where REALTORS® will be able to purchase software and use it with data from any MLS operating on the RESO standards.
I deferred my planned post focusing on our Training Department to share this news. If you have questions on any RMLS™-related topic that you would like to have answered, I encourage you to post a comment.
![MLS Insight: RMLS™ Scores RESO Data Dictionary Certification]()
by Gail Hare | Jun 25, 2015 | RMLSweb
RMLS™ Forms Committee Chair Maureen Bonfiglio (left) works with RMLS™ staff member Christina Smestad to plan 2015 committee strategy.
MLS Insight is a series about how things work at RMLS™.
The RMLS™ Forms Committee is responsible primarily for what information is collected in Listing Load on RMLSweb. They also consider how that information is available for searching, as well as the contract language in the Exclusive Right to Sell agreement that RMLS™ provides.
Maureen Bonfiglio, RMLS™ Director and Chair of the Forms Committee for the past two years, has actually been a member of the committee for more than ten years. She has reviewed and discussed thousands of suggestions in that time. In her words, “the RMLS Forms Committee is instrumental in providing the best venue possible for the successful marketing of homes for sale. Each year dedicated REALTORS® volunteer their time to serve on this committee to review suggestions from RMLS™ subscribers and address real estate trends. We encourage you to email us with any suggestion you feel would enhance the listing input or provide important information to our membership about a property. If you would like to serve on this committee please contact Christina Smestad at RMLS™.”
The 2015 Forms Committee will meet later in the summer. It usually takes two or three two-hour meetings to review and discuss all the suggestions.
Last year, for example, the committee reviewed about 170 suggestions over the course of two meetings. The work of the committee resulted in 47 recommendations for changes to the collection and searchability of property information, which were all approved by the RMLS™ Board of Directors in November 2014.
Changes approved include additional tax ID fields to denote parcels included with the listing, additional fields in several of the supplement forms, additional values in several fields, and an increased number of value choices in several fields (i.e., increasing Garage Description maximum choices from one to three, and Lot Description from one to two.) Search improvements include a streamlined search for residential listings with dual or multi-household living possibilities and any bedroom on the main floor.
A special subcommittee reviewed the Green/Energy Efficiency fields with the objective of aligning our fields with national efforts by NAR and NAR’s Green REsource Council. This will result in a new Green/Energy Supplement for RMLS™.
You will see most of those changes at the end of July. Two of the recommendations will be released shortly after that. The ability to add up to 24 photos will coincide with the release of updated photo-loader functionality. A new status – Pending Lease Option (POP) – will also be released a little later. Because accepted offers with lease option terms tend to stay in Pending status for extended periods of time, the new status will provide better information about them and better statistics for the accepted offers with other terms.
There has been a standing Forms Committee at RMLS™ since 1991, when our multiple listing service began. This goes a long way to account for the rich dataset RMLS™ maintains about property listed by our subscribers.
The next post will focus on mapping in RMLSweb. If you have questions on any RMLS™-related topic that you would like to have answered, I encourage you to post a comment.
![MLS Insight: RMLS™ Scores RESO Data Dictionary Certification]()
by Gail Hare | Jun 25, 2015 | RMLSweb
RMLS™ Forms Committee Chair Maureen Bonfiglio (left) works with RMLS™ staff member Christina Smestad to plan 2015 committee strategy.
MLS Insight is a series about how things work at RMLS™.
The RMLS™ Forms Committee is responsible primarily for what information is collected in Listing Load on RMLSweb. They also consider how that information is available for searching, as well as the contract language in the Exclusive Right to Sell agreement that RMLS™ provides.
Maureen Bonfiglio, RMLS™ Director and Chair of the Forms Committee for the past two years, has actually been a member of the committee for more than ten years. She has reviewed and discussed thousands of suggestions in that time. In her words, “the RMLS Forms Committee is instrumental in providing the best venue possible for the successful marketing of homes for sale. Each year dedicated REALTORS® volunteer their time to serve on this committee to review suggestions from RMLS™ subscribers and address real estate trends. We encourage you to email us with any suggestion you feel would enhance the listing input or provide important information to our membership about a property. If you would like to serve on this committee please contact Christina Smestad at RMLS™.”
The 2015 Forms Committee will meet later in the summer. It usually takes two or three two-hour meetings to review and discuss all the suggestions.
Last year, for example, the committee reviewed about 170 suggestions over the course of two meetings. The work of the committee resulted in 47 recommendations for changes to the collection and searchability of property information, which were all approved by the RMLS™ Board of Directors in November 2014.
Changes approved include additional tax ID fields to denote parcels included with the listing, additional fields in several of the supplement forms, additional values in several fields, and an increased number of value choices in several fields (i.e., increasing Garage Description maximum choices from one to three, and Lot Description from one to two.) Search improvements include a streamlined search for residential listings with dual or multi-household living possibilities and any bedroom on the main floor.
A special subcommittee reviewed the Green/Energy Efficiency fields with the objective of aligning our fields with national efforts by NAR and NAR’s Green REsource Council. This will result in a new Green/Energy Supplement for RMLS™.
You will see most of those changes at the end of July. Two of the recommendations will be released shortly after that. The ability to add up to 24 photos will coincide with the release of updated photo-loader functionality. A new status – Pending Lease Option (POP) – will also be released a little later. Because accepted offers with lease option terms tend to stay in Pending status for extended periods of time, the new status will provide better information about them and better statistics for the accepted offers with other terms.
There has been a standing Forms Committee at RMLS™ since 1991, when our multiple listing service began. This goes a long way to account for the rich dataset RMLS™ maintains about property listed by our subscribers.
The next post will focus on mapping in RMLSweb. If you have questions on any RMLS™-related topic that you would like to have answered, I encourage you to post a comment.
![MLS Insight: RMLS™ Scores RESO Data Dictionary Certification]()
by Gail Hare | Apr 30, 2015 | RMLSweb
Distribution Services Staff Kim Hutchinson and Jeff Mitchell.
MLS Insight is a series about how things work at RMLS™.
Distribution Services at RMLS™ facilitates and manages the electronic transfer of RMLS™ listings outside of RMLSweb. RMLS™ listings appear on the internet and are utilized in applications that support REALTORS®—all in accordance with agreements between RMLS™, our real estate firm participants, and third party vendors. Currently we have almost 6,000 active data access agreements.
When RMLS™ began serving REALTORS® in 1991, there were no property listings on the internet. In fact, as natural and universal as the internet now seems, the World Wide Web was only invented in 1989 and it was not until 1993 that commercial providers were allowed to sell internet connections to individuals. That is when the explosion began in earnest and web traffic over the internet increased by 300,000%.
At RMLS™, an internet presence was approved by the Board of Directors in November 1995, and the first appearance of RMLS™ listings occurred in late April 1996. The internet created radical change in the way business was conducted in many industries, and 1998 was a year of intense discussion and debate in the real estate community about how the internet could and should be integrated into the multiple listing service. That November, the consensus from those discussions became the first RMLS™ Internet Policy. It put the brokerage in the driver’s seat. The basic premise of that first policy—that no listings would be posted on internet without the consent of the participating firm—remains the guiding principle for data distribution today.
Today, RMLS™ listing data is utilized in a variety of ways by our participants. Many offices and individual brokers have their own websites, where they display the listing data according to the IDX (Internet Data Exchange) and/or VOW (Virtual Office Website) policies. These policies are hammered out by National Association of REALTORS®. Firms may also instruct us to send only their own listings to various internet portals or syndication aggregators. This is how listings are funneled to sites like Zillow, Homes.com, OregonLive, etc. Firms can also request data sets to drive products that are used internally, with no consumer display. These can include statistical analysis, AVM creation, CRM programs, transaction management platforms, etc. Because Distribution Services is not part of the core MLS service, data access fees are charged that offset the expense of the program. The service providers, not the subscribers, pay these access fees.
Jeff Mitchell, Distribution Services Technician, manages all the agreements and administers the flow of data. Jeff says that when our subscribers ask about the format of the IDX data, he explains “RMLS™ makes IDX data available in a raw data format, so you will need an IDX Service Provider to process and populate this data on your website.” Forms and Documents on RMLSweb has a list of IDX service providers that are already established with RMLS™. Each of these service providers offer different services, as well as different monthly fees. We are also happy to work with new providers, but it takes some time for them to ramp up.
Kim Hutchinson, Data Quality Technician, works with the RETS computer that dishes up the data. Kim, along with other staff at RMLS™, work closely with RESO, the Real Estate Standards Organization, whose mission is the standardization of both the process and real estate data that is distributed. This benefits our subscribers by increasing the variety of tools and applications available to them.
The Distribution Services department is committed facilitating the flow of our participants’ listings outward in accordance with their direction and with timeliness, quality, and efficiency. You can contact Distribution Services via email or by phone at 503-872-8053.
The next post will focus on the RMLS™ Forms Committee. If you have questions on any RMLS™-related topic that you would like to have answered, I encourage you to post a comment.
