{"id":279,"date":"2006-09-03T08:47:08","date_gmt":"2006-09-03T15:47:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/?p=279"},"modified":"2007-05-17T14:32:41","modified_gmt":"2007-05-17T21:32:41","slug":"work-the-numbers-redfincom-is-not-much-of-a-business","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/279\/work-the-numbers-redfincom-is-not-much-of-a-business\/","title":{"rendered":"Work the numbers: Redfin.com is not much of a business . . ."},"content":{"rendered":"

If the New York Times<\/i> devotes 2700 words to a puff piece on Redfin.com<\/a>, how many of those words would you expect represent the contrary point of view? If you said 1,350, to reflect the chimerical idea of balance, you haven’t spent much time reading the New York Times<\/i>. If you said zero, you spend too much of your time reading Little Green Footballs<\/a>. The Times<\/i> would never, ever present a completely tendentious article without at least a feint at balance. Marlow Harris<\/a>, whom I admire no end, gets to offer this extensive and comprehensive counter-argument:<\/p>\n

Some agents say the biggest problem with Redfin is that it complains too much. “Someone may be trying to manufacture controversy, even going so far as to bait other real estate practitioners, invite ‘war stories’ on their blog and whine to Congress and to newspaper reporters that they’re being treated unfairly,” said Marlow Harris, a Seattle agent with Coldwell Banker Bain Associates who also runs the real estate blog 360digest.com.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I can’t imagine how much of Marlow’s time the Times<\/i> wasted in order to stuff her mouth with a straw man, but I will bet a very tall dollar this is not all she had to say.<\/p>\n

In reality, the piece is Redfin.com PR, but the hook is a couple who were turned away, like Mary and Joseph, by an evil innkeeper of a real estate agent. I’m going to fisk this article a little, not a lot, because it’s interesting.<\/p>\n

First, did the Times<\/i> lack the opportunity to present a contrasting point of view? Of course not:<\/p>\n

But the seller’s agent refused to show it to them. Why would she turn away an eager buyer?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

How about because she could double her legal liability for no additional compensation<\/a>? Was that so hard?<\/p>\n

“You can find out more on the Internet about an eBay Beanie Baby than you can about a $1 million house,” said Glenn Kelman, chief executive of Redfin, a licensed broker in Washington State and California.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Oh, good grief. I think the “secret” fields in an MLS listing are stupid, but there are damn few of them, and none of Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If the New York Times devotes 2700 words to a puff piece on Redfin.com, how many of those words would you expect represent the contrary point of view? If you said 1,350, to reflect the chimerical idea of balance, you haven’t spent much time reading the New York Times. If you said zero, you spend […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,6,5,27],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-279","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"hentry","6":"category-disintermediation","7":"category-marketing","8":"category-real-estate","9":"category-redfincom","11":"no-featured-image"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":281,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/281\/if-bill-clinton-ran-redfincom\/","url_meta":{"origin":279,"position":0},"title":"If Bill Clinton ran Redfin.com . . .","author":"Greg Swann","date":"September 3, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Of the two \"innovative\" cowbird brokerages discussed in this morning's New York Times, the stronger of the two is BuySideInc.com. They're rebating even more of the buyer's agent's commission than is Redfin.com, but their actual profit center is in originating the loan -- a well-understood, fast, cheap, office-job function. Even\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Disintermediation"","block_context":{"text":"Disintermediation","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/disintermediation\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":303,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/303\/reading-the-fine-print-at-redfincom\/","url_meta":{"origin":279,"position":1},"title":"Reading the fine print at Redfin.com . . .","author":"Greg Swann","date":"September 8, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Sellsius&176; digs out the details in Redfin.com's Terms of Service. Very interesting reading... Technorati Tags: blogging, disintermediation, real estate, real estate marketing","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/blogging\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":290,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/290\/dissecting-glenn-kelman-of-redfincom\/","url_meta":{"origin":279,"position":2},"title":"Dissecting Glenn Kelman of Redfin.com . . .","author":"Greg Swann","date":"September 5, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"From comments at Rain City Guide. I didn't address this weblog entry from Redfin.com CEO and broker Glenn Kelman because I wasn't sure how to strike a balance. But today, Dustin Luther offered this:For those that haven't seen Glenn's comments on his blog, I highly recommend heading over to this\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/blogging\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6907,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/6907\/video-clips-of-redfincom-ceo-glenn-kelman-from-the-bloodhoundblog-unchained-preview-event-in-seattle\/","url_meta":{"origin":279,"position":3},"title":"Video clips of Redfin.com CEO Glenn Kelman from the BloodhoundBlog Unchained preview event in Seattle","author":"Greg Swann","date":"February 15, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Marlow Harris of 360Digest.com took these clips of Redfin's Glenn Kelman as he spoke with us Thursday afternoon at Zillow.com headquarters in Seattle: Technorati Tags: BloodhoundBlog Unchained, disintermediation, real estate, real estate marketing, Redfin.com","rel":"","context":"In "Disintermediation"","block_context":{"text":"Disintermediation","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/disintermediation\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":566,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/566\/identifying-mavericks-socrates-jesus-cyrano-and-glenn-kelman-we-dont-have-to-love-the-truth-we-just-have-to-live-with-it\/","url_meta":{"origin":279,"position":4},"title":"Identifying mavericks: Socrates, Jesus, Cyrano and — Glenn Kelman?!? We don’t have to love the truth, we just have to live with it . . .","author":"Greg Swann","date":"October 23, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"This is me in a comment at Mike's Corner. Mike Price is looking for nominations for the most influential mavericks in the real estate industry, individuals and companies. Share your thoughts with him.I've been thinking about this quite a bit lately, although the words I use in my own mind\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/blogging\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2701,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/2701\/redfincom-builds-new-listing-oversight-tools-for-sellers\/","url_meta":{"origin":279,"position":5},"title":"Redfin.com builds new listing oversight tools for sellers","author":"Greg Swann","date":"March 4, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Here's the news, snipped to the quick:Online real estate broker Redfin Corporation today released Redfin Listing Metrics, a dashboard for Redfin's listing customers to analyze neighborhood inventory trends and recent sales, and to compare their listing's online traffic to that of other listings in the neighborhood.That sounds slick, doesn't it?\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Disintermediation"","block_context":{"text":"Disintermediation","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/disintermediation\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=279"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}