Seattle brokerage firm Redfin has launched a web-based tool that provides customers with the performance statistics of agents in marketplaces where Redfin competes. The service is free to consumers.
The tool is called “Scouting Report.” Redfin pays local MLS organizations to allow them to post performance data that traditionally was only available to participating MLS-member real estate professionals. The program allows shoppers to pull up various REALTOR® names and compare performance stats on a ‘one-on-one’ basis. Redfin says they are going a step further (than similar services)… “To help sellers select a professional to market their home.”
Redfin is a brokerage firm that offers customers a 15% percent commission credit, subject to specified terms and conditions. The “commission credit” is usually deducted from what is customarily the buyer-side commission. How can they afford this? Per their website “the investors in Amazon and Facebook back Redfin…” and their agents are employees who are paid “customer satisfaction bonuses rather than a commission.”
The Oct. 3 overview from The New York Times shares insights from Glenn Kelman, Redfin’s chief executive, who asserts “the tool (Scouting Report) provides data on roughly one million agents.” Agent response has ranged from militantly opposed and reviewing legal options to acceptance as the next logical technology tool.
Question: How do you think this type of tool will impact the industry?
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