The Property Listings Triangle Area Home Buyers Do Not Know Exist
Many home buyers believe that they can find anything on the Internet, and that if it’s on the ‘net, it must be true.
But about 40% of homes — nearly half —sold in the Triangle (Raleigh, Durham, and Chapel Hill) area never appear online.
And besides, many of the properties listed on Zillow and other national sites were in fact sold months ago. National real estate websites are concerned with selling advertising, not about helping home sellers find their dream home.
When it comes to searching for your dream home in Raleigh, relying on national sites like Zillow and Trulia is not enough. In fact, you are missing out on a huge portion of available homes and may be viewing homes that are already sold.
How Do Homes Vanish on Zillow?
Let’s first go through the process of listing a home.
Homes Enter the MLS
When a Realtor lists a property for sale, the home enters a private local database called the Multiple Listing Service, or MLS. All of the data in the MLS is owned by the local Realtor Association, which is in charge of releasing home data.
Sellers Share Home Data with Zillow
MLS exchanges the active listing inventory with approved real estate firms and Realtors’ personal websites. Here’s where Zillow comes in: A home seller and listing firm can agree to share the data on approved national websites through a process called syndication.
Property Information Breaks Down
But when national sites like Zillow get local real estate data, the information “break downs,” leading to misinformation in the home listings, such as:
- inaccurate online home values
- wrong listing agent
- incorrect contact information
Think of it like a game of telephone. The original message changes every time someone passes it along the line.
This is why new listings are delayed for days or weeks before being posted and sold properties are not updated quickly (if at all).
National re-syndicated sites like Zillow are often the first resources for home buyers, but they should be the last.
Serious Triangle Homebuyers Shop Locally
If any home in our local real estate market makes its way onto national real estate websites, it’s a second-hand listing. Right now, 25% of the homes that are for sale in our Wake County area never show up on Zillow or Trulia — not at all.
If you’re a Triangle area home buyer and you’re shopping on the national websites for the perfect home, you are missing out on 1 out of every 4 homes for sale, and a lot of the homes you are seeing already have new owners.
Buy Local with Linda Craft & Team
Top-producing real estate teams can deliver home buying resources that can help you find your dream home among Raleigh’s “underground” real estate market, including:
- new home listings
- “coming soon” inventory
- networking connections with other Realtors
- thousands of off-market homes on MLS
If you want accurate, real-time information on homes for sale, shop locally with Linda Craft & Team. Call or click today to see the other 40% of the real estate market that many Triangle area home buyers do not know exists.