by RMLS Communication Department | Oct 30, 2017
This Week’s Lockbox Activity
For the week of October 16-22, 2017, these charts show the number of times RMLS™ subscribers opened SentriLock lockboxes in Oregon and Washington. Activity increased in both Oregon and Washington this week.
For a larger version of each chart, visit the RMLS™ photostream on Flickr.
UPDATE (November 28, 2017):
SentriLock made some internal changes on October 20th that impacted the information provided to RMLS™. This post has been updated to reflect the corrected data.
by RMLS Communication Department | Oct 23, 2017
This Week’s Lockbox Activity
For the week of October 9-15, 2017, these charts show the number of times RMLS™ subscribers opened SentriLock lockboxes in Oregon and Washington. Activity decreased in both Oregon and Washington this week.
For a larger version of each chart, visit the RMLS™ photostream on Flickr.
![Simple Stats, SentriLock Agent Safety: Ask Technical Terry]()
by RMLS Communication Department | Oct 20, 2017
Ask Technical Terry is a series RMLS™ aims to offer once a month. RMLS™ subscribers will drive the content—submit any question about RMLS™ to Technical Terry in the comments or by emailing communications@rmls.com. Don’t be shy—we won’t identify you by name.
Dear Technical Terry,
My clients just asked me for some market statistics. The statistics module on RMLSweb and Market Action are crazy good, but I just need some simple, easy to understand stats. Any ideas?
Simple Statistics in Stayton
Dear SS,
Of course I have some ideas! There are two really easy places to see and/or print some stats that your clients may find compelling.
One: when you run a search and scroll down to the “Detail View” tab in your search results. At the bottom of each section is a nice synopsis of the properties contained within the section, with the sections separated by listing status. Here’s what that section looks like:
Quick and easy—but not easy to print.
If you want to print a simple, yet statistically effective report for your clients choose the “Summary Only” report from your list of report options. Here’s what that simple yet effective report looks like:
The report gives you and your clients great info on some of the basic stats we talk about all the time. Solds, if they are part of your search, even have sale price to list price ratio.
If neither of these options are good for your needs, have a look at the Statistics menu on the main navigation bar. It gives you many options to compile statistics you and your client may find useful, including the statistical summaries documents which compile years worth of Market Action data for each published area within the RMLS™ region.
Technical Terry
Technical Terry!
Do you keep up on the news? It seems REALTORS® are being accosted when performing showings! There seems to be more and more of it happening. I heard that SentriSmart™, the SentriLock app, has a feature for agent safety. What the heck is that, and how does it work?
Terrified in Troutdale
TT!
In fact I do keep up on the news stories about REALTOR® safety issues around the country. While there are many best practices to use to help your safety as a REALTOR®, SentriSmart™ does provide a resource that may provide you confidence in showing vacant homes or homes to new clients.
To access and set up the agent safety feature in SentriSmart™, follow these steps:
- Log in to SentriSmart™ on either your iPhone or Android.
- Go to the Settings option in the app.
- Tap on Agent Safety and enter your PIN.
- From the Agent Safety page, add your emergency contacts by clicking on the blue + sign. The app will access the contacts stored on your phone and allow you to pick one or more contacts to be included in the list of people the app will contact.
- Enable “Automated Safety Check.” Once enabled, SentriSmart™ will send you an alert approximately 90 seconds after you have opened the lockbox key container. If you do not acknowledge the first alert, a second alert will be sent after approximately 60 seconds. If you do not acknowledge the second alert, an email and text message will be sent to the contact(s) you’ve added to your contacts list in the app. If you have several contacts in that list, the app will alert all of them simultaneously about the potential safety concern.
- Tap on Accept to agree to the Release Agreement, then enter your PIN for verification.
Here are samples of the texts you and your list of contacts will receive if you don’t respond to the two notifications.
Hope that this SentriSmart™ feature can help you feel less terrified, Terrified in Troutdale! It’s great that you’re thinking ahead to prepare for safety issues before they occur.
Technical Terry
by RMLS Communication Department | Oct 16, 2017
This Week’s Lockbox Activity
For the week of October 2-8, 2017, these charts show the number of times RMLS™ subscribers opened SentriLock lockboxes in Oregon and Washington. Activity decreased in both Oregon and Washington this week.
For a larger version of each chart, visit the RMLS™ photostream on Flickr.
![Simple Stats, SentriLock Agent Safety: Ask Technical Terry]()
by RMLS Communication Department | Oct 13, 2017
Not all REALTORS® who subscribe to RMLS™ have an intimate familiarity of the RMLS™ Rules and Regulations. This is why the Data Accuracy staff work hard each day to reach out to subscribers and correct issues that have been spotted in listings or address other concerns called in by fellow REALTORS®.
As Data Compliance Manager I’m relatively new to RMLS™ but one of my roles is to educate subscribers about the RMLS™ Rules and Regulations in our ongoing effort to ensure data accuracy on RMLSweb.
One of the most basic questions our subscribers may ask themselves is this: what happens when a RMLS™ subscriber breaks one of the RMLS™ Rules?
The answer depends on the rule, and whether a formal complaint was received. There are two types of issues that get sent to us. The most common of these is done using the report issue button that is found on the listing in RMLSweb, calling the RMLS™ Help Desk, or sending an email to rules@rmls.com. This is an anonymous process and is helpful to us in identifying errors on listings as well as rules violations.
The second type is the formal violation. A formal violation is not an anonymous process and involves accusations of rule breaking that could carry a sanction. These are far less common but we take them very seriously when they happen. Between January and July 2017 RMLS™ had received six formal violations. All of them were regarding various misuses of a lockbox (Section 5.1.l. Lockbox Access). Of those, three were for not following showing instructions, two were for entering a property while it was in pending (PEN) status and the last was for using it, the lockbox, for something other than real estate business. The six violations were reviewed by the Rules Committee and a total of $1,350.00 in fines were sanctioned. In one case, lockbox privileges were suspended.
The RMLS™ Rules and Regulations Committee has requested that reports about the number of formal violations, the type of violation, and the result get shared periodically with subscribers. RMLS™ will be reporting updates throughout the year, so keep watching for these reports throughout the year!
