housevalues launched homepages.com this morning. It's looking more like a real estate brokerage site. Soon agents won't be needing their own site because all the lead aggregators will be doing all the marketing.

Yet another way for Housevalues to sell crappy leads to agents.

Hey Jaber;
I just went to homepages.com via yahoo search. They don't seem to offer anything different that most of us already offer.
But they should of named it some thing else. My search showed that they are currently in the #1 position, but look at position #5.

NICE!! I want leads from that source!

Appropriate competition for Housevalues if you ask me!

Inman news today
"And Maureen Morell, a Realtor for RE/MAX 200 Realty's Winter Park office in Florida who is also an early adopter of HomePages, said she hopes the new Web service will increase the number of property listings she handles while driving more buyers to work with her directly. By working with both sellers and buyers directly, she can reduce her listing commission while saving money for buyers, too, she said."
Back to that old commission thing again.

That's the idea.

Looking from the other side homepages is also saying "they ( the agents ) don't seem to offer anything different that we can't offer.

They main differenc will be they can spend millions on branding the homepage site.

That said, homepages.com is nothing more than the home page of housevalues and justlisted. More and more lead sites are becoming like a real estate brokerages slowly replacing today's broker sites.

This shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone. Third parties are getting deeper and deeper into our pockets.

Today's brokers will become tomorrows agents. Tomorrow's agents will become next year's employees.

It's inevitable unless agents stop supporting these sites. Like you said it comes down to that thing we call commission.

The weak agents who can't generate there own business will become next year's employees.For brokerages that do alot of mass advertising these companies sure do stink at lead generation.I believe the problem is newer agents are embracing technology and growing with it while alot of brokers that own companies are in denial that there old ways of doing business isn't where the future is at.So we have alot of brokers and companies teaching outdated techniques that are ineffective in todays environment to generate leads.It's amazing agents will give money to these sites when they can take the same money and generate ten times the leads on there own.Alot of these companies selling this crap have never even been in the re business.

Dan, LOL.

I just noticed the #5 site. Too funny.

I happen to think homepage is one of the best names on the web from a recognition standpoint. It's hard to forget something as basic as a home page.

The company happens to own both homepage.com and homepages.com.

People are likely to compare products and services offered on the homepage site than the domain name.

If agents created a firm definition of a "referral" vs. a "lead" and paid accordingly... these lead aggregators would have a hard time staying around. They'd probably actually have to do some work... heavens.

That's not an easy task what would you call a referral that doesn't turn into a sale? A lead?

Work is exactly what the lead companies are starting to do. Many agents are still beating their heads over poor leads they received from a year or two ago but these companies are now hiring staff to do the qualifying of leads.

You can't stop innovation by playing defense. In industry ( mainly agents ) need to take an offense position if they are to remain in business.

Yahoo, realtor.com, and homepages are becoming brokers without being brokers.

Notice how I've included realtor.com as a third party.

Guys, great discussion, I couldn't agree more. I have been fighting off these companies in my market for quite some time and I refuse, absolutely refuse to pay anyone for "MY LEADS"

A referral that doesn't turn into a sale is a referral that doesn't turn into a sale. That's what it is.

Brokers should (in my opinion) refuse to pay for unqualified leads and a "referral" should be just that. Most consumers have no idea their info is being sold as a lead.

These companies are all the effect of the soon-to-be-gone hot real estate market and they see it coming and are trying to convert into some form to justify thier existence.

Some will just flat out open a real estate brokerage arm... and then thier sales leads will go to them (ie. realestate.com). The bottomline is that someone has to do the work.. and that someone will dictate what they are willing to pay for leads.

What does a slow market have to do with people wanting know property value and for sales info? Are you sayign that in a slow market consumers will stop visiting websites to request justlisted info and house values?

Homepages.com exists because they're able to market the same services that agents provide.

I can pretty much assure you that homepages.com will become a broker soon.

Every successful lead generator will become a web driven real estate company one by one.

It's going to be a war between marketers and
service providers. A good servicer provider ( agent ) will win hands down everytime.

But here's the problem.

67% of consumers deal with the first realtor they come in contact. If homepage is the first in contact the agents become service providers subject to the lowest price.

Jaber,

You are right on here. It is going to be a war. Of course it has been a war for the last 5 years but I agree it is going to get much, much worse.

But, a good marketer will always survive and thrive.

Just being a good or even a great Realtor isn't going to be enough in the near future.

I hope the agent community can stand up and win as marketers. If we allow the third parties to win as marketers then we become a commodity based on price.

We just need to regain our position as first in contact. Lead sites are making agents the second in contact and that means we no longer control the selling process.