

Show HN: Open Listings is hacking real estate - rgbrgb
https://www.openlistings.co/

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ahulak
How do you plan on gaining national coverage of listings? Between the agents,
brokers, aggregators, and MLSs the data supply chain is incredibly fragmented.
Securing access to all of this data is an incredibly time intensive process
that requires a LOT of relationship building. Unless of course you try to go
the 'redfin' route and become a licensed brokerage in every state... but
then.. you lose your edge and you're essentially competing with Redfin.

How do you plan on getting all of that listing data?

Otherwise, very cool idea - just trying to figure out how you plan to overcome
that.

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jschoenholtz
Great questions Austin. We've spent the last 6 months "exploring" the data
supply chain and have learned first hand how fragmented and closed the system
really is.

National coverage is nearly impossible unless you go through an aggregator
like ListHub or Point2, but this doesn't work for real buyers because of
delayed, inaccurate and incomplete information. The only reliable way to get
listing data in most regions is by opening an office and joining the local
MLS.

Our non-answer is that we plan to focus on our clients in California for the
time being while we nail the customer experience before thinking about
expansion.

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ahulak
Very cool - thanks for the answer!

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rgbrgb
Hi HN, we're reimagining real estate for a generation that grew up with
e-commerce. We've been working full time for a couple of months now and this
is our HN debut.

We'd love to know what you think of this. We're hoping the DIY aspect
resonates here as much as it does with us.

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state
Are you guys a brokerage? How can I buy a property by sending you an email?

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jschoenholtz
We're a registered brokerage. Self-service but with expert support when you
need it, you keep the agent commission.

Send us an email if you're interested in becoming one of our first clients and
we'll get you setup.

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balor123
What's your business model then?

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jschoenholtz
We'll charge a small brokerage fee to start but plan to offer $0 commission
closings in the future for clients who utilize partner services. There are
other revenue streams we are looking at as well.

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bratsche
Sounds like it might be cool, but I'm hesitant to put my email in there in
order to just browse around.

~~~
jschoenholtz
We hope to remove this requirement very soon :)

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Mandatum
How do you plan to set yourself apart from the hundreds of other real estate
listing startups that have come about in the past 5 years?

~~~
rgbrgb
We don't just list homes, we sell them in our app and let you avoid paying
commission to the buyer's agent (up to 3% of the sale price is refunded from
your down payment).

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benjymau5
What exactly does this app do? How does it save me money? Will it be US only
or available internationally?

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rgbrgb
We're LA and SF only for the time being. We save you money by refunding most
of the buyer agent's commission (usually 3% of the total price). We're able to
do this because we're automating a lot of the time consuming things normal
agents such as pushing you listings as they come on the market.

~~~
benjymau5
How do you get the listing information? I assume you wont be connected into
every realtor database so where are you pulling data from?

~~~
jschoenholtz
We have real-time listing data in LA and SF at the moment as broker members of
a local MLS. The only real way to get quality data for a listing product is to
connect to every realtor database.

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hschoenburg
looks awesome. I want an invite!

