[Photo Credit: Moon Amtrack]
Via the Inman Blog: This week the Northwest MLS fined Redfin, the Seattle-based online real estate brokerage $50K for the content in Redfin's "Sweet Digs" blog. The MLS judged that Redfin's bloggers violated the rule forbidding realtors "from advertising each other's listings." Just a few days after the 60 Minutes report on Redfin and the traditional 6% commission. And in Washington DC this week, at the NAR's midyear conference, Alan Dalton of Move. Inc. stepping up as spinmeister while David Lereah retreats into the ether:
Not only have we as an industry not been consumer-centric, it's as if we have been mooning them... In an age where everything is speeding up, our responses tend to be superficial and lacking in depthDalton also argued that making service your number one value was what your cleaners do -- not your doctor or attorney. "People pay us for our expertise". Managing to insult cleaners, doctors and lawyers in just one sentence. No word on whether the mooning will continue, or if consumers will have to kick in a few kisses with the 6%.
· Redfin fined, forced to shut down review blogs [Inman Blog]
· Industry moons real estate consumer [Inman Blog]