Frequently asked questions

Open Real Estate is a national residential real estate data-sharing initiative founded by leading real estate firms committed to consumer choice, market transparency, and overall industry efficiency. Open Real Estate aims to streamline the distribution of property information, expand access to housing inventory, and support a more open, competitive housing marketplace.

Open Real Estate is founded by AGNT, Inc. (eXp Realty / NextHome), HomeServices of America, Inc., Keller Williams and Real REMAX Group.

All licensed and participating residential real estate brokerages or franchises, and their corresponding agents. Open Real Estate is an open environment that welcomes all interested in supporting its founding principles.

Brokerages can register their interest in participating in Open Real Estate here.

Agents can sign up to receive updates here.

Open Real Estate’s platform has three key features:

• A system brokers use to enter listings, consistent with minimum standardized fields
• A national repository of listing data
• A way to distribute that data and share its value with the people who create it

Open Real Estate is currently working through the RFP process with several national technology vendors for the design and launch of its technology platform and expects to have this process completed during Q1 2027.

Open Real Estate exists to maximize opportunities for both buyers and sellers. In creating a platform that puts its agents in control over how listing information is shared, Open Real Estate protects marketing choices for sellers while providing buyers with access to the broadest possible inventory. This helps real estate professionals better serve both their listing and buyer clients.

Real estate markets work best when homes are easy to find, and buyers are free to compete. As many sellers conclude, a property achieves its true market value when the full market can see it. Any friction introduced into the open marketplace is not in the spirit of providing the best opportunities for sellers or buyers. Efficient, transparent, and robust markets produce the best possible price discovery for homes, and a well-functioning housing market promotes affordability and helps address supply and demand imbalances over the long term.

Unfortunately, today’s real estate marketplace is deteriorating as large amounts of available inventory is being cloistered and marketed privately to a limited group of buyers, relegating the public marketplace to be forever known as the market of last resort. These conditions create friction and opportunity for discrimination and potentially other unlawful behaviors. It can also cause a breakdown in the aggregation of data on home pricing and sales, with downstream consequences on the ability of banking, appraisal and insurance companies to properly value real estate and protect buyers, sellers and homeowners.

Open Real Estate requires its participant listing brokers to submit a property to the Open Real Estate database within one business day of the listing agreement being executed with a homeowner. At that time, Listing Brokers can choose to make that listing visible only to Open Real Estate participants in good standing or to syndicate that listing to the public which includes local MLS sites, real estate portals and other destinations.

• Input. All listings must be entered into the Open Real Estate database within one business day of the listing agreement being executed with a homeowner, whether input occurs via Open Real Estate technology or an existing MLS input.
• Participant. A property that chooses to go “participant view” is put into a section of the Open Real Estate database where only agents that are associated with participating brokerages can see it and it cannot be publicly marketed by anyone, including the listing agent and the listing brokerage.
• Market. A property that chooses to go “market” is put into a section of the Open Real Estate database where all agents see it and it is now openly marketed by the listing company and any agent within the MLS through an IDX feed. Open Real Estate has full discretion over where the database’s listings are syndicated. Once a listing of any participant is public, it must be syndicated to the Open Real Estate database, if not already originated in Open Real Estate.

No. Open Real Estate will work in partnership with existing MLS systems by seamlessly distributing comprehensive property information and listing details information to the MLS, as well as real estate portals and other users of the data. Open Real Estate does not set or change MLS rules. Local MLSs keep their own rules, and Open Real Estate focuses on its principles of expanding buyer opportunity, protecting seller choice, protecting data integrity, and strengthening industry cooperation.

Over time, Open Real Estate may advocate for various housing policies at the federal and state levels that align with our principles and our consumer-first approach to residential real estate.

• Welcome all participants from the brokerage/franchise community that wish to join. Brokerages can sign a letter of support here, and agents can sign up for updates here.
• Conduct informational sessions on Open Real Estate’s long-term vision.
• Finalize governance and long-term planning efforts.
• Hire Open Real Estate level leadership and staff to drive the organization forward each and every day.
• Finalize technology selections, implement, and begin to roll the system out to participant companies.
• Engage with the MLS community to provide a clear understanding of what Open Real Estate is, and is not, and how the organization will complement MLS at the local level.
• Work to establish a national listing standard that meets the needs of all industry participants while allowing for local MLS groups to continue to manage “the last mile” with specific local fields necessary for their communities.