The Almanac

NEW REALITY LISTING SERVICE DEBUTS TO MIXED REVIEWS  
by Francesca Pethel
 
Montgomery County's old computerized listing service was finally switched off June 30, forcing real estate agents to rely on the new state-of-the-art Metropolitan Regional Information Systems (MRIS) for real estate agents to work with.

Realtors apparently have mixed feelings about MRIS, which has run in tandem with the old system for some months and which will ultimately cover most of Maryland, half of Virginia, parts of West Virginia, and D.C. Montgomery County was the first MRIS region to go live back in January, and Buyer's Edge president Steve Israel thinks this was appropriate. "There was no better group of agents to do it, because Montgomery County has an enormous number of professional, up-to-date Realtors."

>Enthusiasts say MRIS offers agents a great deal more capability than the old system, such as space for photographs and extensive search facilities, but even they admit that the new system has growing pains... One MRIS enthusiast is Steve Israel, president of Bethesda- based Buyer's Edge, the exclusive buyer brokerage.

Israel points out that a large part of what MRIS does is to pull together into one integrated system information that previously had to be gleaned from a number of different systems. "This is tremendous for the agents who stick with it," he said, adding that the cost of upgrading and the demands of learning a new system will prompt a weeding-out process of those Realtors who don't want to invest the time or money on getting up to speed. At the Buyer's Edge, Israel has spent $15,000 on computers, printer and software designed to work specifically with MRIS. "We can go in and capture MRIS data, download it on to our own hard drives and then manipulate the information," he said, explaining that this means he can create his own capabilities. One of these is the Buyer's Edge tour. When a client is unfamiliar with the area, Israel's program can take sample listings within a given price range from a variety of neighborhoods and manipulate them in logical order so that the customer can go on a self-guided tour taking the most convenient route. "A buyer can see 25 neighborhoods in one afternoon," said Israel, adding that he sees MRIS as a "quantum leap forward in the quantity and quality of information available to realtors..."