Why is it considered taboo to have a commercial property listed with your local MLS service?

What taboo? Our MLS has many commercial listings, and I have one as well. That said, most purely commercial brokerages don't participate in MLS...darned if I know why.

It's not really taboo depending on what it is.

Cumming,Ga is not far from me at all so I know the area.

Most people don't put commercial listings in regular gamls and fmls because it's not needed. If it's a small piece of land or a small building thne yes you might find an interested buyer there.


If you are selling a business and not real estate then www.bizbuysell.com is where it's at.

If your selling office space www.cityfeet.com is a good one and there is also Dorey's first cls.

If you are selling land for assemblage,retail,industrial etc. or selling tic's www.loopnet.com,and www.costar.com is where most list at along with networking.Big deals aren't usually regular buyers but developers and institutional investors etc.

Why do you think it's "taboo" to have commercial property in the local MLS?

In lots of areas commercial brokers keep their listings to themselves and don't want to share commissions with others. However with the advent of the Internet and easier access that custom is changing a lot.

I have had several "Commercial Brokers" tell me that the investers they work with fraun on listings that are on MLS.

Maybe these Investors "frown" because they shy away from the rigors of an open marketplace ?

I do mostly multi-family and I always advertise them in the mls.
I consider the job of the listing agent to advertise and promote the property as much as possible... putting it into the MLS gives it further exposure.

From the buyers perspective, I have investors thinking that when something is not in the MLS is a better deal, because no one knows about it... is silly really... each deal should be evealuated on its numbers and assumptions. Also sometimes if something has been in the MLS for a long time, then people think that people have looked at it and it probably has no value.

Again, the deal should be evaluated on its merits and not on whether or not is in the MLS, loopnet or costar... any smart investor should be able to understand this.

Good luck.

That's probably because the investors are looking for MOTIVATED sellers.

If you do any business in commercial you will understand that sellers are holding on to cap selling rates of a few years ago and buyers are at the other end of the spectrum wanting to purchase a good deal in a down market.

Most of the stuff in the MLS is overpriced bigtime. Many brokers who put properties in the MLS do not have the expertise to guide there seller on price.

Just a for instance I find alot of agents who list land know nothing of soil composition,topography of the land,what a pre-forma entails from a buyers perspective, they don't know about traffic counts,if any road widening and infrastructure improvements are on the way from the DOT. They also have no clue about site costs to get pad ready and timelines to close.

For instance there was some land we were looking at in a great location,unfortuneately it dips in some areas about 40 feet so the cost just to get level and site ready from the engineering report was 235k an acre not including land purchase costs.

Needless to say we didn't buy that one.Land assemblages the bigger the better as you can get a better per acre price to develop because the job is bigger for the contractors.

It's just like anything else your residential plumbing job at 500 or the commercial job at 10,000,no questions there.

Thanks for all the input, wealth of info.