Brokers Not Threatened by Net

Before the digital revolution, real estate agents controlled details about which properties were for sale as if they were guarding the Pentagon Papers.

Enter the Internet. With a click-click at any number of Web sites (and the number seems to grow daily), consumers can find scores of properties in a given price range or neighborhood with details about nearby shops, crime and school test scores.

Add to that the ability to get a loan and find escrow and title companies online, and you can quickly see that there are scads of ways consumers can use a mouse to get a house.

The initial reaction of the residential real estate community to this new world order, observers said, was something akin to fear and loathing. Brokers, who were used to being an integral party of nearly every aspect of the deal, started feeling as detached as the homes they were showing.

Today, local brokers and industry honchos say agents are more secure with their status, given that the lion’s share of transactions still involve a broker at some point. The savvy agents, they say, are now looking for ways to make technology work in their favor.

“Four, five, six years ago, as the Internet was coming, many of us didn’t know what that meant,” said Robert Moles, president and chief executive of Cendant Corp.’s real estate franchise group, which includes the Century 21, Coldwell Banker and ERA brands. “And I think there was a legitimate concern.

“I think if you did a poll today, across the U.S., there’s probably a higher level of confidence that technology is going to be used as a really nice tool for the consumer and the agent.”

If nothing else, observers say, technology has compelled agents to reexamine their role in the complex dance that is a home purchase. And in a growing number of cases, they say, the standard 6% commission paid for the services of an agent (or agents) is giving way to a more a la carte pricing plan that recognizes the self-help role of the consumer.

Brokers and agents, “are under tremendous pressure, both in terms of the prices they charge and because consumers are ever more acclimated to getting information on their own,” said Jack Segner, a senior manager with Iproperty.com, a real estate service provider, and author of “Sams Teach Yourself e-Real Estate Today.”

The local agent, he said, “is not going away.” But he does foresee more agents offering “an unbundled service” for a fee somewhere south of 6%.

“I think it’s becoming more prevalent and I think it’s the definite trend for the future,” said Segner.

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Observers are correct that, so far at least, it does not appear that the Internet has thinned the ranks of Realtors.

In California, the number of licensed real estate professionals has dropped by about 16%, to 307,000, in the last 10 years. But since 1997, when Internet use by house shoppers and sellers began to rise, the number of licensed professionals in the state has increased, from a 10-year low of 297,359 to the current figure. (Of course, the increase stems not from the Internet, but from rising property values, which reheated the real estate market).

The National Assn. of Realtors’ 2000 profile of home buyers and sellers showed that more than a third of the respondents--consumers who bought or sold a home in 1999--said they used the Internet in some way. That’s up from a teeny 2% in 1995.

At the same time, a whopping 87% of Internet users eventually purchased their home through an agent or broker, the survey said. That’s more than the 76% of non-Internet users who bought through brokers.

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What the Internet does is help consumers become more educated about the whole baffling process, and some experts find that a refreshing change.

“The overwhelming majority of people do nothing to educate themselves about the home-buying process,” said Randy Johnson, a Newport Beach-based financial-services specialist and author of “How to Find a Home and Get a Mortgage on the Internet.”

“Most people are incredibly clueless.”

For that reason, Johnson said he doesn’t “ever see the real estate professional being aced out of the market. They’re just too valuable.”

Johnson, who heads a mortgage-brokerage service, is among those who saw a trace of dread cross the collective face of the residential real estate industry when house-hunting consumers began to surf the Net.

“Other than classified ads, and driving up and down the street, that information [contained in the Multiple Listing Service] was tightly controlled by the real estate industry,” said Johnson. “And they felt that loosening up that information would be a death knell to them.

“Any type of industry reacts hostilely to change and I think this one did in this case,” he said. “But I think people realize that now that the information is opened up, it actually helps their business.”

Wendy Furth, a broker with Fred Sands/Coldwell Banker and the 2001 president for the Southland Regional Assn. of Realtors, said that while the Internet has cut down on some of the work for agents, it has not changed the fundamental nature of the job.

“Our job has never been just to find a house,” said Furth. “Our job is to facilitate the transaction. So the Realtor is still very much at the center of the transaction.

“We know the laws,” she added. “We’re a litigious society and I’d prefer to pay a professional to take care of that.

“As far as the footwork, if the client wants to call 10 different agents to see 10 different properties they can do that, but it’s not the most efficient way.”

Overall, Furth said, the increased use of technology in real estate is “making my existence wonderfully easy.”

Among the other digital doodads either currently in use or on the horizon are:

* The i-Lead Realtor presentation card, a mini CD-ROM that can be given to a client (or potential client) containing video, graphics, text and other interactive multimedia content about the agent or a property.

* WINForms 2000, a software program that allows agents to print out for or e-mail to a client all the forms needed for a transaction.

* EKey, a key safe that can be controlled by satellite, that can be used to track showing activity from a remote location and that can block access to any unauthorized agent.

* Learning.net, a site where real estate brokers and agents can take continuing education courses needed for license renewal.

And Furth said some agents are experimenting with giving their clients a temporary password to access the industry’s closely guarded home-sale listings for the San Fernando, Santa Clarita, Conejo and Simi valleys along with Burbank and Moorpark.

“I love everything that’s happening,” she said. “I love all the tools. Everywhere we turn it’s getting easier and easier.”

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Valley@Work runs each Tuesday. Karen Robinson-Jacobs can be reached at karen.robinson@latimes.com.