Day One of CMLS 2010 Conference Gets Rave Reviews

Oct. 1, 2010 - PRLog -- CHICAGO – The Council of MLSs (CMLS) 2010 conference, hosted by Midwest Real Estate Data LLC (MRED), began in earnest today with a full day of presentations that not only informed but entertained. “I cannot express how proud I am of MRED staff in putting on such a great conference,” said Melanie Blackeney, 2010 CMLS President.

The keynote address was delivered by Stefan Swanepoel, noted futurist and prolific author, whose latest book “Surviving Your Serengeti” will be coming out next spring.  Stefan’s presentation “Top Trends Impacting the Future of the Real Estate Industry” provided a hard look at the many factors impacting real estate today. With today’s economy being what it is, not all news was good, but Stefan was able to provide an informative yet entertaining look at where we are and where we might be heading.  One of his most thought provoking statements was “(t)here are twice as many Realtors® 65 and over as there are under the age of 40,” indicating an aging industry needing a significant infusion of youth to stay abreast of all the technological progress.

Larry Romito of Quality Service Certification, Inc. then introduced the crowd to the concept of “Out of Sight Service – Management of the Invisible.”  MLSs and the real estate industry in general are very much a service oriented business, and Larry is an evangelist for the implementation of systems that enable us to measure how effectively we provide our services.  Mr. Romito stated that “if you want a teenager to behave, turn up the lights; if you want him to misbehave, turn down the lights,” illustrating the notion that if you want people’s best behavior, a good strategy is to draw attention to it.

Larry then moderated a panel to discuss Ratings, Rankings and Recommendations of real estate agents, brokerages and other transaction participants – should we or shouldn’t we be rating our own customers’ service levels and do we open ourselves up to legal liabilities by doing so?.  The panel consisted of Bob Hale of the Houston Association of Realtors®, Brian Carroll of the Peoria Area Association of Realtors®, Brian Larson of Larson/Sobotka PLLC and Andrea Rubin of Yelp.  The panel participants strongly favored the use of Agent Ratings as a way to measure performance and hold agents accountable for how they handle their client relationships, though Mr. Larson recommended implementing certain legal protections as a part of any ratings program.

Highlighting the afternoon sessions was a presentation by Marcel Bryar from Fannie Mae, discussing their Short Sale Assistance Program.  Also appearing with Marcel were Merri Jo Cowen of My Florida Regional MLS, Shelley Specchio of the Northern Nevada Regional MLS and Jan Dean of the Suncoast MLS, all three of whom have entered into agreements with Fannie Mae and are current participants in the Program.  The panel unanimously related that their experiences have been very positive and worthy of immediate implementation by MLSs.

The day wrapped up with the return of Stefan Swanepoel who enlightened and amazed the crowd with his views on the “Trends and Impacts of Social Media”.  Stefan stated that location based technology is the number one trend impacting social media today, and also said that “mobile media has evolved into ’the primary device’ in a way that the fax machine never did.”

CMLS 2010 has certainly lived up to its promise, and it is only the first day . . .

Those interested in more information about CMLS 2010 are directed to www.cmls2010.com.

Council of Multiple Listing Services (CMLS) is the premier forum and resource for Multiple Listing Service associations.

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MRED is a real estate data aggregator and distributor that provides the largest multiple listing service in the United States (by listing volume) to over 40,000 customers, with property information encompassing northern IL, southern WI and northwest IN