Hi Joe,

I agree with you about Realtor.com, I have never recieved strong leads from them. We were talking about them in our office on Thurs. and the sales people from realtor.com are very pushy. One of our agents had a call from them and when she told them she was not going to re-new the sales person said "you must be going out of business". I feel they are over rated and do less then P2A. Just my 2 cents...

It's all about the money Joe, you know that.

Realtor.com with 4 million listings wow just were I want to be for $1,200 bucks and another $2400 bucks for a banner ad, throw in your board dues, MLS fees, and if you don't bay your dues on time they at least in Orlando add another $60 bucks and yet another $60 bucks if another 30  days go by for a late fee!!! how do you spell rip off ?? and don't forget to donate RPAC..

Its all about >....> http://youtube.com/watch?v=8_ofFa50LzY

Gee Point 2 it cheap in comparison!complete with paid advertising if you upgrade to help defray the cost of our site.

To top it off we get syndicated all over the net and then some included.

As you can see Joe I am not impressed with any of it

VanceVent

Joe I have disliked Realtor .com for several years and won't go into any explanation since they aren't worth the time. They are a waste of money and I have not found anyone that could show me where they were getting a bang for their buck. However I have heard a lot tell me it was a waste of money. Majority rules!

The World Series of Websites Results.  P2A - 1  Realtor.com -0

Just remember Realtor.com sells advertisings.  Agents sell real estate.

Have a great real estate day.

Dennis Jonas

83616.com

"It's Your Zipcode, It's Your neighborhood."

I don't have any special set up with Realtor.com...only our MLS feed into it.  Because of the territory I cover, I have received a few buyer leads off it that paid off.  If I can do that at no extra cost to me, why bother paying for it?  I agree, the P2 site is money better spent.

I agree with all of you about realtor.com. When everyone is doing it you are just a me to realtor. You have to offer your seller something different. Realtor.com is just one web site which are listings are already on. By being with P2 we offer our seller many web sites to be on. I will continue to put my money with P2.

[Velda sez: I don't have any special set up with Realtor.com...only our MLS feed into it.]

I as well . . . never felt the need for any more from them . . .

Joe, it has been a marketing tool for my sellers. They beleive it works. Now, my broker has made some deal with the crooks. All of the company listings will be "showcased". You know who owns the company? Realtor dot com, NAR, the "Board", are not here to help or protect you. You are a salesman like me doing the best we can under the conditions we have to work. Good Luck. I hope the decision is the right one for you.

Shame on you, Vance. Talking about money. It's all about the people.

"Shame on you, Vance. Talking about money. It's all about the people."

Gregory, I will try be more serious and not be so hard on NAR, and the other boards and MLS and donate to REPAC.

I went to an anger management class since my last post and I was able to control my feelings about this topic, wanna  see

http://youtube.com/watch?v=o4x-VW_rCSE

Vance, sign me up for that anger management class. I seem to have the same issues and I need to laugh them off. I never saw the Elmo doll so funny. You think I could keep one at my desk for those weekly meetings?

Gregory

Here is our last meeting and Elmo just heard that he  became a Realtor®,  on the phone at his desk..

Here  see how happy he is , you know me I don't kid around about things that are this important..

http://youtube.com/watch?v=8kOs3J0a2aI

Elmo for President!!!

Anybody here uses The Real Estate Book/Online?  If so does it work for you any leads etc..?  I am not a newby any more but a toddler nonetheless.

I don't think P2 is cheap but I do believe it provides more value than realtor.com

We have been experiencing some very push sales people as a matter of fact I tried to negotiate with one the other day and she wouldn't discount her price.  I told her I couldn't afford it. She wanted to know how did I expect to get buyers if I didn't advertise. I told her well how do you expect to get advertisers if your price is so high and you won't neg.   I guess they are feeling effects of the RE market as well.  Actually I think that's good because it highlights that we are somewhat interdependent.

If the 'value' attached to advertising dollars spent is determined by results then it becomes readily apparent that the value of dollars spent with realtor dot com is a negative number for us.  

Will we renew in November? (I'm not sure what their max is this year but I'm sure that will be what they charge us again - $1300??)  

Not a snowball's chance in hades!  

Would I spend $300 for the enhanced package?  Maybe...

Vancetube,

You spend too much time on YouTube! LOL

I'm going to go out today and purchase one of those Elmos and the next time a seller wants to overprice their home $100,000 over market value or more I'm going to take it out and play it once, pack my belongings while Elmo is doing his "sales pitch" and thank them for their time as Elmo and I stumble laughing out the door!

Ok, back to Realtor.com. Hmm, I do use them and I have gotten a few leads that I closed on as a result. A few. I don't like that they pro-rate our cost based on the number of listings we had in the past year. But if my number of listings drop below the number it was the year before they don't pro-rate me again and drop my cost! LOL What a dealio!

Perhaps I need a double dose of the anger management myself Vancetube but I'm so sick of someone trying to sell me something to get their stinky little digits into my pie. GGGRRRRRRRRRR!

Now, I wanted to post this one into a different post because it is through Realtor.com that I had found this so called service and I think you will find that they are paying attention to Point2 and what we are doing here. But I want to point out that although they are saying that you are able to use this software (and you folks will have to forgive me because this was about two months ago and when I put something behind I put it behind me for good and not only forgive but I also forget - or maybe that is senility creeping in!) to obtain and market yourself as a "NEIGHBORHOOD EXPERT" it doesn't actually do neighborhoods. It does "areas" by zipcode.

So I signed up for a "trial period" of this thing. I used it for one evening and discovered that they were full of fecies! So the next morning I called to cancel - I could sure get signed up online but there was no way to cancel online! So if you make the mistake I made be sure to keep any phone numbers you find - you are going to need them.

I get this guy on the phone and tell him that I want to cancel it and of course, being the great marketing gurus that they are, he asks me why to which I tell him that it doesn't do neighborhoods.

He proceeds to tell me how I need to click the "tutorial" in the upper right corner. LOL I tell him that I have already reviewed the tutorials and I'm not interested. He then proceeds to ask me if I have the software open. LOL I told him that I have already uninstalled it and that I am not interested in this and want to cancel. We do this for all of about ten minutes back and forth and he is still trying to get me to "open the software" even though I told him I have removed it completely from my computer about 18 times by now. Ok, so I'm getting a little ..ok ALOT....irritated at this point. And I very sternly and angrily say to him..."LOOK! I HAVE MADE MYSELF VERY CLEAR! I DON'T WANT TO CONTINUE WITH THIS! CANCEL MY ACCOUNT!". The next thing I know and without warning I am placed on hold where I sat for another 20 minutes.

So I hang up and I call back. But I am put into a que where I sat on hold for another 30 minutes. I'm thinking at this point that they must have caller I.D. or something. So I hang up and try once more where I left that phone on speaker (thank God it wasn't costing me long distance charges) and it stayed on hold for over two hours before I gave up and called the support line for Realtor.com.

Now apparently this is some third party provider approved by NAR or some crap. I get to some CSR in charge of "pissed off agents" LOL and she does the usual "I am sorry you were treated this way. This shouldn't have happened. Let me take care of this." So two days later I finally get an email stating my account had been cancelled.

Ok, now I'm completely depressed and I'm going to go sob for an hour. NOT!

It's no wonder the terrorists want to kill us! LOL They all probably came here for a vacation before they were terrorists and then went back to the middle east and signed up to become a one after experiencing some of the not so great, protect the business not the consumer customer service! I know it makes me wanna kill! LOL

Linda, the Real Estate Book in my market was a far bigger rip off than Realtor.com.  They sell the leads for about 2 years now - it used to be a good resource. Once agents here caught on, the actual book is now about 12 pages.  After 2 years before with good leads from it, I asked my rep, what happened to my leads?  He said, gee, I don't know.  

Joe, I too was floored when the Realtor.com rep told me that it is not a lead generator for us-especially after a year paying premium for featured listings.  I do get ok leads and some traffic, but not as much as I used to, and not less since dropping the featured listings. I noticed they have a membership now for the public and expect they are selling our leads too.  It is important though for me to have the showcase listings because it does drive a good amount of traffic to my site and I get good out of state buyers and sellers with it.  It is also still a good listing tool.  But I agree I think they will need to revise their fee schedule to keep going when times are hard for us.  

I've been shopping for some time for a better one that touches many, but it sure isn't homes.com or some of these other guys promising to make me the worlds best agent for just $250 a month plus pay for click or wanting a monthly fee or per lead fee PLUS 25-35% referral fees for bad leads (eewwwwwww, c'mon get real). And I feel bad for anyone paying any of the crooks selling you back your own leads.  What a racket!!  NAR should do something about all that.

I am finding that many Internet home shoppers like to "fly under the radar" until they are ready to actually buy and the true buyers won't sign up for anything anyway.  They know they are in control and do not want to be "sold".  They like to make their own decisions.  Being out there with multisites directing them to me in my market with a great P2 site has really helped to be the one they call.  Designations and continuing ed don't hurt either.  Happy selling all!

Gee Scott sorry to hear about your experience with all of this,

sounds like you had a heck of a time, did you try calling tech support to cancel ? they are 24/7  and always ready to help!

Here is a link to a 24/7 tech support to see how helpful they are....

http://www.illwillpress.com/tech2.html

Look at all of these comments about Realtor.com.  When Realtor.com was created their reps went from office to office to give their presentation and sign agents up.  They lied about everything they would provide for their price from day one, and lied to NAR also to get where they are today. You don't have to join Realtor.com to have your listings on their site, they automatically get them anyway.  They also are never up to date on the listings.  I have clients that find listings on Realtor.com and they are sold or expired.  Also if you don't watch out they will automatically renew your membership with your credit card if they have it on record.  They are the sole reason I got my own domain and website way back in 1998.  Another joke is the search engine sales people telling you that they can get you on the top in the search engines.  I fell for that one time, at $250.00 a month and saw no change in leads.  Now when they call I ask them if that is the case how did they find me in the first place.   No not interested!  I've had many websites through the years, and P2 is the absolute best, and I receive more leads with P2 than I have with any other website company.  We need to let them know we are tired of wasting our money.

I could not agree with you more!  My P2A site was the best FREE addition that I have made to my marketing arsenal!

O.K., don't renew! If, like my franchised office, a 'special' deal has been made. And, if all 'enhanced' listings pop up first in a search. Where, oh where, will that leave your sellers. Hmmm. 3bd, 2Bath, Garage, zip code, $250-$300,000 = 200+ listings to view.

Vance, you better sign us all up for that anger management course. Except Scott. He sounds like he is past that stage.

Nina says, "We need to let them know we are tired of wasting our money."

Well, here you go......

http://youtube.com/watch?v=Gf-Q2rDd6Tw

When I started with Realtor.com it was about $185/year no matter how many listings. We could write our ads in HTML to make the font larger or use colors, bold, scrolling text, etc. For that price I got a web site and e-mail. Last year they wanted to charge me $2400 to renew the subscription and 2 featured ads. They gave me the same line about not for lead generation purposes.

Realtor.com is owned by Move Inc which also owns Move.com and Top Producer. I've heard that Move.com is or will be selling leads to agents. (This has not been verified, but I've heard it from several sources). I would be happy if our entire MLS pulled out of Realtor.com.

Our MLS (Realcomp) is in a lawsuit with the FTC because we don't (and won't) feed exclusive agency listings to public web sites including Realtor.com.

http://www.realcomp.com/news/newsarts/loneholdout.pdf

My last little gripe- since Realtor.com is not owned by NAR, and since there's obviously nothing in Realtor.com's agreement with NAR to prevent price gouging, I think NAR should either not allow Move Inc to use the term Realtor or let us use Realtor in our domain names (other than next to our own name). And if Realtor.com wants our listings, they should pay US (our brokers) for them. Without free listings there would be no Realtor.com.

Linda, the Real Estate Book seems to have pretty good coverage out here in our area (Northern Illinois) ... it is the only printed advertising I use. The one we're in has about 40 000 issues every 4 weeks. And the leads generate quite a lot of traffic to our website. But you have to work these leads just like website leads ... a lot of long term work and hopefully some outcome after awhile. And, our sellers like it because it is something they recognize ... you can get it just about anywhere ... from banks, to stores ...even local Chinese restaurant.

As to Realtor.com ... I posted about it couple weeks ago ... I ended up renewing because my subscription went down in price, so I figured I'd keep my sellers happy for one more year.

Ref: Jackie's post

That's what I suspected all along since 1998 when I first heard of Realtor.com and mistakenly thought it was created by NAR to justify their higher and higher fees. What a good move I made due to my healthy skeptism( never paid them a dime). Never believed in the near monopoly of the NAR, but only see it as a nessesary evil for networking purposes.

Agree with Jackie, they should never have allow them to use the REALTOR brand because the general public does not know the difference now and it is construed as being the same as NAR , which is highly misleading.

   I guess will start to take a second look at this here site, Point2.

Michaela,

How did you get them to go down on the price?  I've heard that they are refusing to negotiate price this year.  What's your secret?  Inquiring minds want to know!

Our broker took over all the listings and showcased them.  Now they want to  charge 38% referral fee.  They want to collect from us to enhance them too.

I had a recent client call me and complain about Realtor.com because he didn't like the fact that he now had to look through 2 list.  The showcase listings and the regular listings.  I gave him a better place to go. Their greed will be their demise! Does any body know if Realtor.com

activity is going down?

For Move (formerly Homestore), real estate is more about location on the Web. The company's Realtor.com lists some 3.5 million homes for sale. Move has realigned its business to focus on two target markets: real estate services and move-related services. Corresponding with the company's 2006 name change from Homestore is the new Move.com site, a real estate listing and move-related search site that replaced its HomeBuilder.com and Homestore.com sites. The company attracts visitors via agreements with partners such as the National Association of Realtors, and also provides listings for AOL, MSN, and Yahoo!.

Revenue primarily comes from the sale of software and advertising (both online and in print publications). The company's Top Producer software offering is a customer relationship management application for realtors.

Move's move-related services include online advertising products and lead generation tools. The company distributes ad products to new homeowners shortly after their move through its Welcome Wagon direct mail offering. It also sells new home plans and related magazines.

The company's former Web sites had dominated the Internet home listings market and brought an inquiry by the Justice Department. The SEC made its own inquiries into the firm's financial reporting, forcing the company to restate earnings and spurring some top executives to resign.

(Several former executives subsequently pleaded guilty to corporate fraud.)

FMR Corp. owns 12% of the company's common stock.

Top Competitors:

Monster Worldwide               RE/MAX

Move, Inc. (NASDAQ (GS):

Doing Business As                

"Homebuildercom"

"Homestore Management Company"

"Homestore Sales Company"

"Movesales"

"Realtor.Com"

1-Year Sales Growth:                  14.9%

1-Year Net Income Growth           3,992.6%  !

36-Month Revenue Growth           31%

Stock Price History:

   52-Week Change                         -50.59%

( Weekly Downtrend since 12/06 testing support, expected to go down further.Not good for Co. Financials)            

Monster Worldwide

36-Month Revenue Growth           62.6%

No secrets ... I'd say it was pure luck ... I believe I stayed just below the number of listings that would have kicked me back into the higher price group. I was being more careful about what I did with my own expired listings though ... My sellers and I used to let them expire and then write up a new listing agreement, which Realtor.com saw as a new listing ... nowadays if we have a reason to let something expire, as long as it's within a few days following the expiration, we (the sellers and I) fill out a form for our MLS and they re-activate the original listing, so it's still the same MLS listing number.

I don't think they are willing to negotiate on the actual Enhanced listings subscription but they do on other services ... they may not lower the price but may offer you more for the money (such as zipcode subscriptions, etc. ... I was actually offered a pretty good deal but decided not do go with it ... it would have helped me get more listings ... but realistically, right now I want BUYERS not to flood the market with even more listings!)

To keep those renewals and new sales coming, Realtor.com has other challenges besides getting agents to understand that it is a media company that sells exposure. It has to show agents that it is more effective than what they are currently doing in terms of on and offline marketing solutions.

As long as agents see newspapers as generating as many or more solid leads than the Internet, agents will continue to treat Internet solutions like Websites and listing enhancements as secondary.

So far, NAR's latest figures show the Internet and newspapers neck at neck at 41 percent, in terms of which media homebuyers use to shop for a home.

The Internet will always be held accountable by Realtors for lead generation, which is something even Realtor.com won't be able to get away from, no matter how the company reinvents itself.

Wow, good thing realtor.com only wants to rip off you guys in the States...

I guess going back to the original comment here, it's all about your own personal preference where you want to spend your advertising dollars, I have tried a lot of things that haven't worked as well and I just choose to work hard, advertise locally to capture the buyers who are actually looking in the neighborhoods you have your listings, farm a certain area and stick to it, if they see your ads and your face month after month they will call you eventually!

I get calls every week saying "I saw your ad or I see your face or your signs all over" THAT is how you will be successful in this business and not waste too much money on sites that don't work...

Off topic, I just left a top producing team environment where the team leader is all about numbers....he has 5 staff on the phones getting him listing appts. everyday, he carries between 20 and 50 listings at times but he works way too hard and is going to die from a heart attack at a very early age...and he has almost NO repeat business and clients.  I finally left the team and am out on my own again and I have done probably 6 or 7 deals since leaving 3 months ago (All but one was a referral or a repeat client)  SO, I guess what I'm saying is instead of wasting thousands of dollars trying to capture new business from realtor.com type sites, invest in the clients you already ahve as they will keep you more than busy if you look after them properly (and it will cost less)  It takes twice as much or more to find a new client than it does to maintain an exsisting one!