Introducing a new segment for CDAR Broker and Office Managers, we bring you our Staying MLS Compliant series of articles and updates to relay to your agents and keep them out of trouble with the MLS. Every month, our MLS team will discuss different rules to know so that you and your agents can remain in MLS compliance. For our first edition, we cover two rules and when to use them: MLS Rule 7.5, Mandatory Submission, and MLS Rule 7.6, Exempted Listings/Seller Instructions to Exclude Listings from MLS (SELM).
Your agent has a signed listing agreement. When does the listing need to be entered in the MLS?
Listings must be entered within one business day of public marketing (signs on the property, social media posts, email blasts, etc.) or within two calendar days after all necessary seller signatures have been obtained or at the beginning date of the listing, whichever is later.
What if there is a signed SELM for the listing?
You must submit the SELM to selm@cdaronline.org within two calendar days of the original listing date on the RLA or from the last signature date, whichever is later. During this SELM period, you cannot publicly market the property (signage, social media posts, flyers, etc.). You may only market the property within your brokerage. If any public marketing does occur, you need to enter the listing within one business day.
RULE 7.5 | MANDATORY SUBMISSION Within one (1) business day of marketing or advertising a property to the public or within 2 days after all necessary signatures of the seller(s) have been obtained on the listing or at the beginning date of the listing as specified in the contract, whichever is later, on any exclusive right to sell or seller reserved listing agreement for the sale of one to four unit residential property and vacant lots located within the service area of the MLS, Broker Participants must input the listing to the service for cooperation with Participants. * Public marketing or advertising includes, but is not limited to, conveying or displaying any information about the property or its availability for sale through or on any: windows, signs, public facing websites, social media, brokerage or franchise operated websites (including IDX and VOW), verbal or written communications (ex: phone, email, text, social media messaging), multi-brokerage or franchise listing sharing networks, flyers or written material or on any applications or through conducting an open house available to the general public. The public would include anyone outside the broker(s) and agent(s) licensed within single listing brokerage and their internal clients as further described in Section 7.6 Only those listings that are within the service area of the MLS must be input. Open listings, rental listings or listings of property located outside the MLS’s service area (see Section 7.7) are not required by the service but may be input at the Broker Participant’s option.
RULE 7.6 | EXEMPTED LISTINGS If seller’s listing is the type that would otherwise be subject to mandatory submission as set forth in Section 7.5, but the seller refuses to permit the listing to be disseminated by the service, the listing broker may obtain an exemption from submission as long as listing broker conducts no public marketing or advertising as further defined in Section 7.5, and submits to the service an exemption certification signed by the seller within one (1) business day after all necessary signatures of the seller(s) have been obtained on the listing agreement or at the beginning date of the listing as specified in the contract, whichever is later. The certification shall state that the seller instructs listing broker to do no public marketing or advertising of any type as set forth in Section 7.5, that the only scope of permissible promotion of the property will occur internally within the brokerage and consist of direct one-on-one communication between the listing broker and licensees affiliated with the listing brokerage and their respective clients (i.e. “office exclusive”) and that seller refuses to authorize the listing to be disseminated by the service. C.A.R. Standard Form SELM may be used for this certification, but in any event, said exclusion shall include the aforementioned representations as well as an advisory to seller that, in keeping the listing off the MLS, (1) real estate agents and brokers from other real estate offices, and their buyer clients, who have access to the MLS may not be aware seller’s property is for sale, (2) seller’s property will not be included in the MLS’s download to various real estate Internet sites that are used by the public to search for property listings, (3) real estate agents, brokers and members of the public may be unaware of the terms and conditions under which seller is marketing the property, and (4) any reduction in the exposure of the property may lower the number of offers made and negatively impact the sales price. In the event listing broker commences any public marketing or advertising on an exempted listing, submission to the MLS for dissemination is required within one (1) business day thereafter in accordance with Section 7.5.
