Connecticut MLS connects with public

Connecticut Multiple Listing Service, a broker-controlled MLS sponsored by the state's Realtor association, this week launched a public property-search site at CTreal.com. The site features interactive mapping and "Sherpa," a drawing tool that allows users to select a home-search area by drawing a series of lines. It's not unlike Neighborhood Wizard, a tool featured at John L. Scott's Web site. John L. Scott uses Microsfot's Virtual Earth for its mapping platform, while CTreal.com uses Google Maps.

Cameron Paine, CEO for Connecticut MLS, said there are plans to send feeds of property information from its participants to Google and possibly other Web sites, with their permission. The CTreal.com site includes residential, commercial, rental properties and vacant land -- MLS officials hope the site becomes more popular for consumers in the state than home-search staple Realtor.com, as is the case with the Houston Association of Realtors' HAR.com site in the Houston market area.

Sharing seems to be in the air these days between MLSs, too, with data-sharing and other cooperative plans cropping up across the country. A National Association of Realtors advisory group is studying the potential for a national "Gateway" for information on properties of all types, possibly with some consumer access -- and a California Association of Realtors group pursuing a statewide data-sharing initiative that could evolve as a true statewide MLS, while local and regional MLSs in the state are workign on their own collaborative ventures.

On the commercial real estate front, the National Association of Realtors this month announced an acquisition that will lead to the creation a national commercial real estate listing and transaction platform. Sam Scott, director of commercial services for the Houston Association of Realtors, which has worked with the company that will form the basis for the commercial portal, described the planned venture as a "commercial Realtor.com."

What's next? Will these various efforts ultimately converge? Or will they collide?

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