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Settling the score on settlement services

By Inman News, Tuesday, September 1, 2009.

The complexity of the home-sale process can leave buyers and sellers alike feeling dazed and confused, with real estate brokerage and mortgage professionals surrounded by a host of other supporting professionals to complete a single transaction: home inspectors, pest inspectors, appraisers, title insurance agents, escrow agents, attorneys and land surveyors, among others.

And the various fees and other costs associated with this gamut of primary and ancillary real estate services can be a source of frustration for consumers, adding thousands of dollars in additional costs to the sale.  more...

HomeServices acquires Koenig & Strey Premium Content

By Matt Carter, Tuesday, September 1, 2009.

Brookfield Residential Property Services has sold Chicago-based luxury broker Koenig & Strey GMAC Real Estate to HomeServices of America Inc., completing a planned disposition of corporate-owned brokerage offices Brookfield RPS acquired in its purchase of GMAC Home Services LLC last year.

As was the case in other recent sales of corporate-owned GMAC brokerages, Koenig & Strey will remain a franchisee of Canadian-based Brookfield RPS' North American real estate network.  more...

Pending home sales surge in West

By Inman News, Tuesday, September 1, 2009.

Pending home sales rose 3.2 percent from June to July, with a surge in sales in the Western U.S. outweighing declines in the Northeast and Midwest, the National Association of Realtors said today.

It was the sixth consecutive monthly increase in pending home sales, a trend that NAR Chief Economist Lawyrence Yun expects to continue before falling off in the first quarter of 2010 if a tax credit for first-time homebuyers is allowed to expire Nov. 30.  more...

ZipRealty tool reveals commission rates

By Inman News, Tuesday, September 1, 2009.

ZipRealty is offering new online tools for sellers that show the commission rates offered by sellers and the number of active buyers shopping for homes in a neighborhood.  more...

Redfin gets on iPhone app bandwagon

By Inman News, Tuesday, September 1, 2009.

Seattle-based broker Redfin is offering a custom-built iPhone application that allows users to upload photos they take on home tours to their account on Redfin.com.

The iPhone app can access all data from multiple listing services where Redfin is a member, as well as for-sale-by-owner and bank-owned (REO) properties. The app also shows how long properties have been on the market and what they last sold for, according to a blog post by Redfin founder and CEO Glenn Kelman.  more...

Seattlepi.com partners with Zillow

By Inman News, Tuesday, September 1, 2009.

The Web site of the defunct Seattle Post Intelligencer newspaper, seattlepi.com, is the latest of 180 news sites expected to offer co-branded versions of Zillow.com by the end of this year, the companies said today.

Zillow announced in April that it would "power" co-branded Web sites of 11 newspaper publishers, including the Post Intelligencer's parent company, Hearst Newspapers.  more...

Realogy quietly exits Homestore scandal Premium Content

By Matt Carter, Tuesday, September 1, 2009.

When circular deals that artificially pumped up the revenue of Realtor.com operator Homestore during the dot-com boom unraveled, the crash of the company's stock and subsequent criminal trial of founder and former Chief Executive Officer Stuart Wolff grabbed headlines.

Nearly a decade later, Cendant Corp. has quietly become the last company accused of helping Homestore inflate its revenue to settle with Homestore investors, who filed a class-action lawsuit in December 2001.  more...