What Is The Multiple Listing Service In Massachusetts

The Multiple Listing Service, or commonly referred to as the MLS, is an extensive property database or “warehouse” of homes for sale.  Just about every region across the country has a multiple listing service.  Massachusetts is made up of several regional MLS’s.

My local Massachusetts MLS is MLSPIN or Multiple Listing Service Property Information Network.  MLSPIN covers the majority of Massachusetts which includes the greater Boston area.  

But there are regions of Massachusetts, Berkshire County and the Cape and Islands that may be covered predominately by another multiple listing service.

Agent participants in the MLS agree to cooperate with other members in sharing the inventory of homes for sale. 

Agents Share Their Listing Inventory

All the real estate agents in Massachusetts pool the inventory of the homes they have to sell into their local MLS.  This makes every home available to every other agent that participates in the MLS or Massachusetts Multiple Listing Service for their local area.

Nowadays, I do not know of a real estate office that does not participate in their local Multiple Listing Service.   Without the local Multiple Listing Service, an agent could not effectively help buyers and sellers in the real estate market today.

Multiple Listing Services are generally run regionally or at a state level.  At one time there was more than one MLS in MA.  But as of recent years, it has come down to one.

How Does Your Local MLS in Massachusetts Help Home Sellers?

How Does The MLS In Massachusetts Help Home Buyers?

Once a home is newly listed for sale, home buyers can be made aware of it as soon as their real estate agents are.  Through technology, once the listing hits the MLS, it is distributed not only to agents but through email alerts to inform homebuyers of the newly listed home.

Through various avenues like an agent’s website or national websites like REALTOR.com a home buyer immediately has access to information on all the homes for sale in Massachusetts listed by a real estate agent.

Historical Data To Analyze The Market

While the MLS is a “warehousing and delivery system” of homes for sale, it goes further than that.

The local MLS allows your agent to research past information that helps home buyers and sellers to make decisions and understand where the real estate market is headed.

It provides data on days on the market, sale-to-list price ratios, and other valuable information that real estate agents find useful in helping both buyers and sellers interpret the market.

Also, the data that the MLS provides for past sales are critical for agents to prepare a Comparative Market Analysis for a home or CMA.  The CMA is a critical tool for a home seller to determine the value of their home as well as give home buyers a fair purchase price for a house they are considering buying.

The Evolution of the MLS in Massachusetts

Before the creation of the Multiple Listing Service, local real estate offices would try to get together on a regular basis to share inventory and agree to cooperate with each other.  The delivery of information was slow and homes would slip through the cracks. 

It was in a buyer’s best interest to bounce from office to office to see if there was inventory from one company that another did not have.

Then the MLS was created and every week or so a “book” was created for each office in an association’s territory and was distributed to each office.  Thus, it allowed buyers to go to one office to see all the inventory in a group of communities and it allowed sellers much greater exposure to the buying pool.

Around 1996 with the growing popularity of computers, the MLS data started to be put online.  In the digital age access to individual offices listing inventory was made much quicker.

Fast forward to today and literally the minute an agent inputs listing data for a home for sale it is distributed not only to the real estate community but the general buying public by what is called an IDX or Internet Data Exchange.

Summary of the Massachusetts Multiple Listing Service

The Massachusetts MLS is a very powerful tool in aiding both buyers and sellers to either market properties or find properties for sale.  It also offers historical data that a buyer or seller’s agent can access that will help determine the fair market value of a home as well as median house price in a community, predict days on market, and so on…

We all hear the term MLS or Multiple Listing Service and as agents, I think we are quick to throw around the term.  I hope this post informs home buyers and home sellers on the impact the Multiple Service has on the purchase or sale of your home.  

Search Homes From the MA MLS

Buyers and sellers do not have direct access to the MLS in Massachusetts.  But, most real estate agents provide data to the public through an Internet Data Exchange or IDX.  

When you go to a real estate brokerage website or a real estate agents website and search for homes for sale, the home you see are provided through the IDX that pulls directly from the MA MLS.

25 Newest Homes to The Market In The MLS in Massachusetts

Search All The Homes for Sale In The MLS in Massachusetts.  Homes are updated every 15 minutes and you can sort in a variety of ways to find your new home.