New Picks for Split Levels!

The following new picks have been added to the Style field to make it easier to search for these properties:

  • 3 Level Sidesplit
  • 4 Level Sidesplit
  • 5 Level Sidesplit
  • 3 Level Backsplit
  • 4 Level Backsplit
  • 5 Level Backsplit

These picks are available only for RAHB listings, so when you use any of them for a search, we recommend that you also choose either Sidesplit or Backsplit (according to what you are searching for) to return all listings in the category.

The new picks are now available in Matrix for broker loading and searching, and will be added to RAHB’s Property Information Forms at the next reprint.

Please note that the old picks of Backsplit and Sidesplit have been removed from listing input, so be sure that whoever enters your listing knows which of the new picks should be used.

If you have any questions, please contact the MLS® Department at 905.667.4650 (Monday to Friday, 8:30 a.m. – 4:30 p.m.) or support@rahb.ca.

 

Reminder: Changes to RAHB Photographer Billings and Services

As of May 1, 2018, RAHB’s photographer, REAL Services, has changed its delivery platform. This has resulted in the following changes for members requesting photos through Matrix:

  • As of May 1, 2018, members will no longer be billed through their RAHB account for photos and virtual tours produced by REAL Services. Invoices will be issued by REAL Services directly to members.
  • Between May 1 and May 31, REAL Services will continue to take front and back photos requested through Matrix. REAL Services will send invoices directly to members during this time.
  • After May 31, the option to request photographs through Matrix will be discontinued – the Photographer’s Instructions field will no longer be available.
  • After May 31, all photography and virtual tours will need to be arranged with and paid for by members directly with service providers.

Please note that REAL Services will still be available as a photography/virtual tour service – please contact them at 905.319.9399 or via e-mail at photos@realservices.ca. Other real estate photo and virtual tour services are available in our area; a Google search for “real estate photo services (city/town) Ontario” yields a sizable number of service providers.

If you have any questions about this change in photography service, please contact our MLS® Department at 905.667.4650 or support@rahb.ca.

Assessment Field – Property Information Form

Q: What value do I put in the Assessment field of the Residential Property Information Form?

A: When you enter information in the Assessment section of the Residential Property Information Form, please ensure you use the Assessed Value appearing on the GeoWarehouse Overview – NOT the amount on the Property Inquiry report from the City of Hamilton, or any phased-in value.

Assessed value is determined every four years, and the increase is phased in over the following four-year period. Assessed value is what the City determines the property to actually be worth (usually less than what it sells for), while the phased-in value is what is used to determine property taxes for that year. It is done this way so that homeowners don’t get a big spike in property tax every four years.

 

Where Do You Find Zoning Information?

Do you know where you can find zoning information for all municipalities within the RAHB market area as well as for the surrounding areas covered by the regional group?

The answer:  in Matrix!

Just click on the Links tab, and when you see the list of System Links, scroll down to Zoning. It’s that simple! Click on a link and you will go straight to the zoning information or, in the case of Burlington, Hamilton, Oakville and Niagara Falls, you can choose to use the interactive zoning maps or read the zoning bylaw.

While you are scrolling down the list of links, why not check out what other information you can link to in Matrix: RAHB sites, tax information for various municipalities, CREA sites, OREA sites and other resources.

Check out what you can find under the Links tab today!

P.S. You will also find links to the Hamilton and Burlington interactive zoning maps through buttons on your dashboard at my.rahb.ca!

Changes to RAHB Photographer Billings and Services

As of May 1, 2018, RAHB’s photographer, REAL Services, is changing its delivery platform. This will result in the following changes for members requesting photos through Matrix:

  • As of May 1, 2018, members will no longer be billed through their RAHB account for photos and virtual tours produced by REAL Services. Invoices will be issued by REAL Services directly to members.
  • Between May 1 and May 31, REAL Services will continue to take front and back photos requested through Matrix. REAL Services will send invoices directly to members during this time.
  • After May 31, the option to request photographs through Matrix will be discontinued – the Photographer’s Instructions field will no longer be available.
  • After May 31, all photography and virtual tours will need to be arranged with and paid for by members directly with service providers.

Please note that REAL Services will still be available as a photography/virtual tour service – please contact them at 905.319.9399 or via e-mail at photos@realservices.ca. Other real estate photo and virtual tour services are available in our area; a Google search for “real estate photo services (city/town) Ontario” yields a sizable number of service providers.

If you have any questions about this change in photography service, please contact our MLS® Department at 905.667.4650 or support@rahb.ca.

Changes to MLS® Policies

The Board of Directors recently approved changes to various sections of the MLS® Policies, as noted below.

The second column notes changes made. Sections in bold indicate amended or added wording; sections struck through with a line (e.g. struck through) indicate the section was deleted.

The full, updated set of MLS® Policies can be found under External Links in Matrix and on REALTOR Link®, under the MLS® tab.

Former Policy Wording Amended/Deleted Policy
Sales
1. When broker loading any sales where the selling salesperson is a non-board broker, members will be required under Selling Salesperson field to enter “NONMEM” on on the comment line (“SOLD BY NAME OF SELLING SALESPERSON) – (NAME OF SELLING BROKERAGE)”.
 AMENDED
Sales
1. When broker loading any sales where the selling salesperson is a non‐board broker, members will be required under Coop Representative 1 MLS® ID field to enter “NONMEM” and under the NONMEM Info tab enter the name of the Coop Representative and Brokerage name in the spaces provided.
MLS® MARKETING OPTIONS
2. The Listing Salesperson will be required to determine which property type is to be considered the “primary” type. The primary listing will be the property type calculated in the Listing & Sales stats program.
DELETED
2. The Listing Salesperson will be required to determine which property type is to be considered the “primary” type. The primary listing will be the property type calculated in the Listing & Sales stats program.
3. If the listing salesperson presently has a listing on the system: it is their PRIMARY
LISTING and any additional property types can be added as SECONDARY LISTINGS by submitting the Property Information Forms only for those listings affected.
AMENDED
3. If the listing salesperson presently has a listing on the system, : it is their PRIMARY LISTING and any additional property types can be added as SECONDARY LISTINGS by submitting the Property Information Forms only for those listings affected.the original
listing MLS® number and the MLS® numbers of any additional listings must be entered in the “AlternateMLSNumber” field of each listing.
4. If the listing salesperson is processing a new listing on the system: he/she simply decides at the time of signing, which property type their wish to be your PRIMARY LISTING by completing the Property Information Form for that property type along with an Agreement Form. At the same time, up to 3 other property types can be submitted as SECONDARY LISTINGS by completing ONLY the Property Information Form for the property types they feel appropriate to market the property. DELETED
4. If the listing salesperson is processing a new listing on the system: he/she simply decides at the time of signing, which property type their wish to be your PRIMARY LISTING by completing the Property Information Form for that property type along with an Agreement Form. At the same time, up to 3 other property types can be submitted as SECONDARY LISTINGS by completing ONLY the Property Information Form for the property types they feel appropriate to market the property.
5. The Listing Salesperson will also complete the Property Information Form for each of the additional property types they would like to have appear on the system, which will be the secondary listings. It is imperative that the relevant information be identical; for example, listing date, list price, address, lot size, legal description, city/town, Seller name(s), expiry date, Listing Brokerage(s), Listing salesperson(s), selling commission and Agreement Change. AMENDED
5. The Listing Salesperson will also complete the Property Information Form for each of the additional property types they would like to have appear on the system, which will be the secondary listings. It is imperative that the relevant information be identical; for example, listing date, list price, address, lot size, legal description, city/town, Seller name(s), expiry date, Listing Brokerage(s), Listing salesperson(s), selling commission and Agreement Change.
6. If the relevant information is not identical, the primary listing will be processed and the secondary listings that are not identical will be returned unprocessed. If there are discrepancies in any other fields (not mentioned in #5 above), they will be input as received. DELETED
6. If the relevant information is not identical, the primary listing will be processed and the secondary listings that are not identical will be returned unprocessed. If there are discrepancies in any other fields (not mentioned in #5 above), they will be input as received.
12. When you send the group of listings to be processed, you will already have determined which will be primary and which will be secondary by the forms you use. These primary and secondary designations may not be changed, either with Amendment to Listing Agreement or at time of reporting the sale. DELETED
12. When you send the group of listings to be processed, you will already have determined which will be primary and which will be secondary by the forms you use. These primary and secondary designations may not be changed, either with Amendment to Listing Agreement or at time of reporting the sale.
13. When the property sells, the sale will be reported to the Association, using the “primary” listing MLS® number and that property type will be the listing used for the statistics. Each of the other MLS® numbers will appear in the sold database under their specific property type, but will not be recorded in the statistics. AMENDED
13. When the property sells, only one of the listings shall be reported Sold and all additionally marketed listings shall be reported Cancelled. the sale will be reported to the Association, using the “primary” listing MLS® number and that property type will be the listing used for the statistics. Each of the other MLS® numbers will appear in the sold database under their specific property type, but will not be recorded in the statistics.
Miscellaneous #22
This policy was originally created by the Joint MLS® Committee. The committee was formed to deal with issues that may arise within the shared MLS® system between RAHB, the Niagara Association of REALTORS®, the Brantford Regional Real Estate Association and the Simcoe Real Estate Board or more commonly known as “STARRS” for (Shared Technology and Regional REALTOR® Services). The Fusion MLS® system has now been retired and the STARRS group disbanded nearly two years ago when the other associations cut over to the Regional Matrix system making it unnecessary for this committee or rule to exist.
DELETED
Miscellaneous #22
This policy was originally created by the Joint MLS® Committee. The committee was formed to deal with issues that may arise within the shared MLS® system between RAHB, the Niagara Association of REALTORS®, the Brantford Regional Real Estate Association and the Simcoe Real Estate Board or more commonly known as “STARRS” for (Shared Technology and Regional REALTOR® Services). The Fusion MLS® system has now been retired and the STARRS group disbanded nearly two years ago when the other associations cut over to the Regional Matrix system making it unnecessary for this committee or rule to exist.


 


Kijiji is Joining the REALTOR.ca DDF® Network

Kijiji

This February, CREA will welcome Kijiji, the popular online classifieds site, to REALTOR.ca’s Data Distribution Facility (DDF®) network of real estate advertising websites.

If your brokerage has opted in to take advantage of the REALTOR.ca DDF® real estate advertising websites, you can soon have the ability to send your MLS® listing content to Kijiji at the same time as REALTOR.ca and all of the other 11 approved real estate advertising websites.

Additionally, you will be able to measure traffic to your listing content on your selected real estate advertising websites, including Kijiji, via your existing workspace on member.REALTOR.ca.

Want to learn more? Visit the DDF® How-to Guide on REALTOR Link®.

Amended Open House Policies

The RAHB Board of Directors has approved amendments to the current RAHB member open house policies. These amendments are now in effect. The most significant changes are:

Open houses may now be cancelled up to 9:00 a.m. the day of the open house. (Previously, it had to be cancelled by Noon the day before).

Although RAHB has an open house date and time schedule for both Hamilton and Burlington areas to ensure consistency, members may now schedule an open house any day, Monday through Thursday, regardless of where the property is located.

RAHB MLS® staff are no longer required to check the open house list, as there may be properties scheduled outside of the traditional dates and times. Members are also required to verify open house dates and time for properties located outside of RAHB’s jurisdictional area.

Previous Open House Policy

New Open House Policy Changes

1. Only MLS® Listings shall be permitted to have an open house and only after such Listing has been received and processed by the Association. Remains the same.
2. As of January 1, 2010 all offices with Broker Load privileges are required to Broker Load and/or cancel their own open houses through the Association’s MLS®System. This section has been deleted.
3. For Members having their open house Board Loaded, the request to have or cancel an open house must be completed and submitted to the Association no later than noon, one (1) business day prior to the open house. This section has been amended:

3. Members who need to cancel their open house, must cancel in the MLS® system no later than 9:00 a.m. the day of the open house.

4. For open houses cancelled after noon one business day prior to the open house, the Member must either be present at the property during the open house time to inform Members of the cancellation, or visibly post a sold sign or a notice informing the Members of the cancellation  This section has been amended:

4. For open houses cancelled after noon 9:00 a.m. the day the open house is scheduled one business day prior to the open house, the Member must either be present at the property during the open house time to inform Members of the cancellation, or visibly post a sold sign or a notice informing the Members of the cancellation

5. When any Member misses their open house, a letter from the Association will be sent to the Broker of Record and the Member shall be fined.  This section has been amended:

5. When a scheduled open house is missed any Member misses their open house, a letter from the Association will be sent to the Broker of Record and the Member shall be fined.

6. Member offices which are located outside of the Association’s jurisdiction shall only be permitted one open house within the Association’s jurisdiction per office per day.  This section has been deleted.
 8. Only one (1) open house is permitted within any thirty (30) day period unless the Seller lists with another office. If a REALTOR® disregards this rule, there will be a letter from the Association sent to the Broker of Record and the Listing Brokerage shall be fined.  This section has been deleted.
9. If bad weather is incurred, roads under construction, or unusual circumstances, individuals must state in writing within seven (7) days of their own open house that they require a new date or forfeit the opportunity to do another open house for sixty (60) days.  This section has been deleted.

Hamilton Open House Schedule:

Day Time District & Sub-areas

Tuesday 10 a.m. – 12 Noon 10-18

Wednesday 10 a.m. – 12 Noon 40-46, 50-53, 56, 60-65

70-74, 80, 84, 85, 87, 88,

662-664, 765-772, 873-879, 980, 981, 1101, 1102, 1103

2000, 2010, 2018, 2028, 2040, 2049, 2059, 2067, 2084,

2100, 2105, 2110, 2115

Thursday 10 a.m. – 12 Noon 20-29, 54, 55, 57

101-104, 436-455, 556-561

——————————-

Burlington Open House Schedule:

Day Time District & Sub-areas

Tuesday 10 a.m. – 12 Noon 34, 35

Tuesday 11 a.m. – 1:00 p.m. 36, 38, 40, 43, 44, 45, 46

Thursday 10 a.m. – 12 Noon 31, 32, 33

Thursday 11 a.m. – 1 p.m. 30

43, 44, 45, and 46 have the option of being placed on the Hamilton open house program

This section has been amended.

 

Hamilton Open House Schedule:

Day Time District & Sub-areas

Tuesday 10 a.m. – 12 Noon 10-18

Wednesday 10 a.m. – 12 Noon 40-46, 50-53, 56, 60-65

70-74, 80, 84, 85, 87, 88,

662-664, 765-772, 873-879, 980, 981, 1101, 1102, 1103

2000, 2010, 2018, 2028, 2040, 2049, 2059, 2067, 2084,

2100, 2105, 2110, 2115

Thursday 10 a.m. – 12 Noon 20-29, 54, 55, 57

101-104, 436-455, 556-561

——————————-

Burlington Open House Schedule:

Day Time District & Sub-areas

Tuesday 10 a.m. – 12 Noon 34, 35

Tuesday 11 a.m. – 1:00 p.m. 36, 38, 40, 43, 44, 45, 46

Thursday 10 a.m. – 12 Noon 31, 32, 33

Thursday 11 a.m. – 1 p.m. 30

43, 44, 45, and 46 have the option of being placed on the Hamilton open house program

While these are traditional boundaries, you are free to hold your open house on any day from Monday through Thursday regardless of where the property is located. Members are required to verify open house dates and time for properties located outside of RAHB’s jurisdictional area.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

When it comes to legal documents, consistency is key

Question: I just saw a listing where the Co-operating Brokerage commission has a condition reducing the commission paid if a buyer is shown the listing by the listing salesperson, but an offer is brought by another REALTOR®. Is this ok?

Answer:  Yes, this is perfectly acceptable, provided the condition in the Remarks section of the listing is the same as the commission on the Listing Agreement, which are both signed by the Seller.

Conditions to the Co-operating Brokerage commission can’t be added to the Remarks section of the Property Information Form, or to an additional Schedule, if they are different than what is on the Listing Agreement. By ensuring that the commission to the Co-Operating Brokerage is the same on the Listing Agreement, Property Information Form, any Schedule to the Listing Agreement and in the Remarks section, you will be complying with Sections 38 and 39 of the RECO Code of Ethics.

Use the Matrix Wildcard * to help you search

When you search in the RAHB Matrix Free Form Boxes, you can expand your search by using the Wildcard * (shift + 8). You can use the RAHB Matrix Wildcard to search in the following ways:

  • *king: this will find items that end with “king” (ex. Mackenzie King, Viking)
  • king*: this will find items that start with “king” (ex. King William, Kingsway)
  • *king*: this will find any items that contain the word “king” (ex. Rockingham)

A phrase can also be surrounded by a Wildcard. For example, *backyard pond* would find any items that contained the words “backyard pond” together.

When searching streets it is a good idea to add a Wildcard to the end of the street name. For example, Lakeshore* would find “Lakeshore”, “Lakeshore Ave.”, “Lakeshore West”, etc.

You don’t have to the use Wildcard Search if you don’t want to, but using it allows you to be as specific or broad in your search as you want.