Bright MLS Delays Enforcement of Crackdown on Pocket Listings

• November 27th 2019

by Nena Perry-Brown

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In October, UrbanTurf reported on a change of policy at Bright MLS which would require real estate brokerages to submit listings to the multiple listing service (MLS) within a day of marketing them. Now, enforcement of this rule is being delayed.

Bright MLS, one of the largest multiple listing services in the country, announced earlier this week that instead of starting to issue fines for non-compliant listings on December 1st, it will start issuing fines on February 1, 2020. In the meantime, the policy remains active. 

"During this busy year-end time, we decided to concentrate on providing extra training and communication, while holding off on enforcement for two months," the release states.

The intention of the new policy is to bring more transparency to a housing market where some properties for sale are often marketed behind the scenes as private exclusives or pocket listings. Now, any marketing, whether it is a physical "for sale" marker, a digital ad, an appearance on a brokerage website or similar, will necessitate that the listing be submitted to Bright MLS. 

This doesn't eliminate the option of "Coming Soon" status on the MLS, and listing agents can still have private listings which are not being shown or actively marketed to the public; the listing agent would submit a waiver to Bright MLS in these cases.

This article originally published at https://dc.urbanturf.com/articles/blog/bright-mls-delays-enforcement-of-crackdown-on-pocket-listings/16191.