Longtime Canopy MLS chief technology officer Steve Byrd has been promoted to lead the organization as CEO beginning Aug. 1.
Byrd’s elevation follows the retirement of Anne Marie DeCatsye, who led the Charlotte-based MLS and its affiliated Realtor association for more than 25 years. Canopy MLS has more than 22,000 subscribers and is ranked as the 17th-largest MLS in the country.
But Byrd told Inman that he does not have any drastic strategic changes planned. Instead, he expects to carry forward initiatives already underway involving expansion, brokerage flexibility, alternative listing-management tools and collaboration with other MLSs. His appointment also completes the separation of Canopy MLS and the Canopy Realtor Association, which owns the MLS. The organizations have had separate boards since 2003 but have continued to share a chief executive.
AnneMarie DeCatsye via LinkedIn
Byrd will report to DeCatsye through the end of 2026. After her retirement, he will assume full authority over the MLS, while the association will be led by a separate CEO. Inman spoke with Byrd about the transition, the future of regional MLS boundaries, industry consolidation and the debate over private listings and pre-marketing.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Inman: Can you explain the leadership transition and why Canopy decided to make this change now?
Byrd: Anne Marie has been the CEO of both the Realtor association and the MLS, and she has been CEO for 25 years. I’ve been the CTO of the MLS for almost 29 years.
We’ve known for a long time that the MLS really needs to be separated from the association. It’s just the way the world is moving. The MLS needs to make more business decisions, while the association is a nonprofit trade organization focused on advocacy and all of those things. They’re two separate businesses.
Canopy Realtor Association owns the MLS. They’re the sole shareholder. We’ve had separate boards since 2003, so they have more or less been run separately, but this is the last and final step. Starting next year, when Anne Marie retires at the end of the year, I’ll be the CEO of the MLS with my own executive committee and our own board of directors. They’re searching for an association CEO now.
Should members expect continuity under your leadership, or do you anticipate a major strategic shift?
Byrd: There will absolutely be continuity. I’ve worked for Anne Marie for 25 years, and all the changes we have planned so far are already underway. I plan to continue with those. I don’t have any drastic changes in mind anytime soon other than what’s already in the works. I’ll just take the ball and run with it.
She has been a fantastic leader. We’re filling her shoes with two people, and even that is going to be difficult. There’s nothing major planned. We’ll continue trying to keep our MLS at the forefront of the business.
How will your background as Canopy’s chief technology officer shape the way you lead the MLS?
Byrd: Everything we’ve already announced and that is coming down the line is about trying to respond to the needs of brokerages, allowing them to manage their own listings and decide what happens to a listing before it comes to the MLS or when it is sent to the MLS.
Trying to stay on top of the changes coming to the industry is part of what I need to do. If we sign up for BLX, Ocusell or other software coming down the line, we want to stay relevant. We want to stay in the middle. We want to keep our brokerages able to serve their clients and not become obsolete.
Steve Byrd via LinkedIn
DeCatsye has said the traditional boundaries of MLSs no longer reflect how large brokerages operate. What is your view of regionally defined MLS territories?
Byrd: It has been a problem forever, for as long as we’ve been in the business. In overlapping markets, brokerages have to belong to four or five MLSs. I don’t think we’re going to do anything drastic that is going to change brokerages’ minds, but we feel that if we have a product and a service that brokers want to come to, then we’ll grow naturally.
Brokers need to be conscientious about which MLS they decide to join. This isn’t Canopy-specific. Nationwide, there’s no real reason for a brokerage to be a member of four, five or six MLSs. They should pick one and stick with it moving forward. It will save them money, and it will improve the entire industry. Consolidation is going to help.
Was there anything in particular that led Canopy to separate the leadership of the MLS and Realtor association?
Byrd: I would say it was technology and changes in technology over time. It is difficult to keep a group of members focused on both the needs of the association and the MLS. If you separate those boards, committees and CEOs, you can find people on the MLS side who are focused on technology, services and the needs of broker members. The association side has a whole different set of needs.
Canopy has emphasized collaboration and data sharing through the Southeast MLS Alliance. Is there a preferred model for MLS growth?
Byrd: There are so many different models, and the majority of them seem to be working wherever they are in the country. We picked our model based on finding like-minded CEOs from other MLSs who were willing to work with us. We initially picked four large MLSs in four states: Canopy in Charlotte, Charleston Trident in South Carolina, Georgia MLS in Atlanta and Realtracs in Nashville.
We’ve since added realMLS in northeast Florida. We picked those organizations because those were people who thought like us, and their CEOs wanted to do something together. It seemed to make sense.
There are a lot of different data-sharing models and growth models out there, and everyone seems to be doing their own thing. We don’t have anything negative to say about any of them. They all point toward consolidation, or at least toward making brokers’ lives easier, and we’re all for that.
What are the primary goals of the Southeast MLS Alliance? Could it eventually lead to deeper integration or shared technology?
Byrd: I don’t know if I have a solid answer to that question beyond making more listings available to more people. Those cities are closely related. A lot of people are moving back and forth between those cities, and most of the time, when people come to the Southeast, they want to stay there.
It also came down to CEOs of MLSs who wanted to work together and were easy to work with. There are MLSs that don’t want to do data shares, don’t want to participate and don’t want to be involved at all. Instead of trying to work with them, we decided to work with the ones that wanted to work with us.
What are the biggest technical or political barriers to greater MLS consolidation?
Byrd: It has a lot to do with resort areas that don’t necessarily want people from bigger cities or other places coming in. There are also people’s jobs. When MLSs merge, you don’t always have enough jobs for everybody. Brokerages drive demand. If broker-owners and broker participants aren’t pressing the issue, then usually nothing happens.
We have Realtor leadership. If our Realtor leadership didn’t think outside the box and move forward, we would never grow. If you’re at a protectionist MLS and you’re not thinking outside the box, you might not grow either. But we’re going that way. There are fewer MLSs every day.
The industry is debating office exclusives, phased marketing and pre-marketing. What is your general view of the push toward private listings?
Byrd: Generally, we want to have products, services and rules that give our brokers the most flexibility. We want our brokers to be able to serve their sellers the way the sellers want to be served. We want to set our system up to provide our members with the most flexibility to do what they need to do.
If that is a private listing or a public listing, we want to give them the most options so brokers will come to us and we can remain relevant. We don’t want to come down on one side. We want to make our members happy.
Do you think brokerages should be allowed to publicly market listings before putting them in the MLS, or should listings come to the MLS first?
Byrd: Of course, as an MLS, I would prefer that all the listings come to the MLS first. But I realize there are scenarios and reasons they might not want to do that. We’re going to do the best we can to develop policies that allow brokers to do what they need to do.
Should home-search sites and portals be allowed to exclude listings that were publicly marketed before entering the MLS?
Byrd: I think that is probably going to be a court decision. We’re going to wait until then.
Historically, the MLS has been viewed as a neutral, collaborative marketplace. Is Canopy trying to maintain that neutrality during the Compass-Zillow dispute?
Byrd: We’re doing our best to stay neutral.
What message would you give Canopy’s members as you prepare to take over the organization?
Byrd: I look forward to leading the organization going forward. We have a fantastic team, and I know I’ll be supported by our Realtor leadership and Anne Marie.
