CLOUD CMA MLS PROVIDER INFORMATION PACKET

Transcription

1 CLOUD CMA MLS PROVIDER INFORMATION PACKET For more information please visit: Cloud CMA is a product of W&R Studios W&R Studios 123 Main Street Suite 201 Huntington Beach CA info@wrstudios.com

2 What is Cloud CMA? Cloud CMA is a web-based report generator for real estate professionals. These reports include a Comparative Market Analysis (CMA), Buyer Tour, Property Reports and Flyers. The reports from Cloud CMA can be personalized and branded. The reports include property data/photo from the MLS combined with information from top websites such as: Google Maps Panaramio Area Photos Zillow Zestimates Demographics Recent Home Sales Mortgage Quotes Walk Score Neighborhood walkability scores Education.com School information Yelp Restaurant ratings Simply put our goal with Cloud CMA is to give real estate professionals a very fast and simple way of generating unique, eye catching, personalized reports that make them look awesome if front of their clients. Links to Cloud CMA Report Samples: Sample CMA: Sample Buyer Tour: Sample Property Report: Several report Themes are included, which can be personalized by color, content and font choices. All reports are rendered as PDF files and stored in the Cloud. 2

3 Cloud CMA also offers real estate professionals a unique method of creating and distributing reports via . The client can be their desktop/laptop or smartphone. The below example is for a Property Report: 1. Cloud CMA subscriber address an to property@cloudcma.com. 2. In the Subject Line of the they would enter the name of their client, The Brown Family. 3. Finally the MLS number or property address would be entered in the Body of the . Cloud CMA severs would verify their account (via the subscribers ), grab the MLS information, and render a PDF with the subscriber s default marketing pages (cover page, resume, etc). Then a link to the Property Report would be sent to the Cloud CMA subscriber. This would all happen in just minutes. This same method could be used for creating a CMA (cma@cloudcma.com), or a Buyer Tour (tour@cloudcma.com). The Cloud CMA subscriber could also include their client s address in the Cc: field and have their clients receive the report at the same time as themselves. Cloud CMA is compatible with most popular browsers including Microsoft s Internet Explorer (7 and above), Firefox, Apple s Safari, and Google Chrome. Cloud CMA RETS Requested Data Fields List Base fields - We'd like as many of these as possible - Fields with an asterisk (*) are the fields we need to search on. * mlsnum address city state * zip zip4 3

4 * streetnum * streetname county subdivision area * latitude * longitude status prop_type prop_sub_type sqft lotsize acres lotdim year_built garages beds baths baths_ quarter baths_half baths_three_quarter baths_full school_district school_high school_middle school_elementary date_list date_pending date_sold date_expired dom price_list price_list_orig price_list_low price_list_high price_sold price_list_per_sqft Feature fields - We'd like any features fields available in this market. - Some examples: price_sold_per_sqft remarks remarks_private showing_inst directions assoc_fee photo_count created_at updated_at photos_updated_at agent_list_id agent_list_name agent_list_ agent_list_phone agent_sell_id agent_sell_name agent_sell_ agent_sell_phone office_list_id office_list_name office_list_phone office_sell_id office_sell_name office_sell_phone! Assoc name Assoc amenities Community Mello Roos Tax rate Cooling Heating Appliances Exterior Interior Kitchen 4

5 View TB map code Zoning Pool Spa Patio Water Electric Gas Assessments Builder Builders tract name Lot description Spaces Photos - We'd like url links to all photos available for each property. Cloud CMA RETS Queries Cloud CMA allows agents to create CMA, Buyer Tour, and Property reports. We DO NOT download the entire MLS and keep it synced in servers on our site. The agents enter criteria and we do real-time RETS searches to download data from the MLS at that moment in time. We basically do three types of searches in Cloud CMA: 1. MLS number search - single or multiple MLS numbers at a time. Very straightforward, simple search. 2. Address search - usually we have to break an address down into street num, street name, city, state, zip and do the search. Also very straightforward. 3. Lat/Lon range search - basically a Latitude range and a Longitude range forming a rectangular proximity search area around a given subject property. This is a more complex query, and I've seen it trip up RETS servers in two ways: o o The latitude and longitude fields on some servers are not indexed, even though these are simple decimal values and are very useful search fields. Because the longitude in the US is a negative number, to search a range you end up with this funky double negative DMQL syntax that looks like this: (LONGITUDE= ),(LATITUDE= ) That can break the parser on some RETS servers. We have come up with a fairly simple way around this on RETS servers in the past. Assuming that the RETS parser is simply querying a View in your database, create a new field called "ABSLONGITUDE" in your View which contains the absolute value of the longitude. On our side, we just set a flag to query that new field instead and the query above becomes: (ABSLONGITUDE= ),(LATITUDE= ) That works for us and is typically pretty easy to implement on the server side. 5

6 This method of real-time searches is more secure, since we do not have all the MLS data replicated on our servers, and provides less load on the RETS server, since we are only searching an extremely small subset of the MLS daily. Cloud CMA and MLS Security Cloud CMA allows real estate agents to easily create custom CMA, Buyer Tour, and Property Reports. It utilizes the best sources of property, school, neighborhood, and other information it can find on the internet to create these reports. The best source of listing data is the MLS, so it interfaces with the MLSs RETS server to acquire listing data for sold, pending, expired, and active properties. We do not aggregate listing data ahead of time and keep a duplicate copy of MLS data on our servers. We feel that this model is a waste of resources, creates synchronization issues, and is a security risk. For these reasons, we query the MLSs RETS server only at the time the user requests a report to be created. Users are typically only requesting listings per CMA or Buyer Tour, and only one listing per Property Report, so these queries are very small and efficient. Since MLS listing data can only be accessed by licensed members of the MLS, Cloud CMA utilizes one of the following three security methods to ensure that only valid, active members have access. Method 1 When a new user sets up their profile in Cloud CMA, they are asked to choose their MLS, then they are prompted for their MLS credentials. The MLS password is stored in our system using RSA public key encryption, and any time it's transmitted, it is done so in that encrypted form. Whenever the user performs a query for property data, we use their MLS credentials to log into the RETS server. If the users MLS credentials are invalid, the login to the RETS server will fail, and the corresponding error message will be relayed to the user. The user can then check their credentials and try again, but they will never successfully get listing data from the RETS server without the proper credentials. Pro: The MLS has complete control over this user being able to utilize MLS data in Cloud CMA, and the user can be cut off at any time using the normal deactivation process built into the MLS workflow. Con: The MLS may not have RETS credentials set up for each and every member. Many MLSs manually set up RETS credentials on an as needed basis, so each member may not already have RETS access. 6

7 Method 2 The MLS provides us (W&R Studios) with specific RETS credentials and instructs us to use those every time we query the RETS server for all of our users. When a new user sets up their profile in Cloud CMA, they are still asked to choose their MLS, then they are prompted for their MLS credentials. The MLS password is stored in our system using RSA public key encryption, and any time it's transmitted, it is done so in that encrypted form. Whenever the user performs a query for property data, we use our MLS credentials to log into the RETS server. Upon successful login, we query the Agent or User table of the RETS server with the agents id and password, then look at the resulting data to make sure this user exists and is an active member. If our query returns no results or an indication that the member is no longer active, the corresponding error message will be relayed to the user. The user can then check their credentials and try again, but they will never successfully get listing data from the RETS server without the proper credentials. Pro: The MLS has complete control over this user being able to utilize MLS data in Cloud CMA, and the user can be cut off at any time using the normal deactivation process built into the MLS workflow. Con: The MLS may not allow querying on the password field in the Agent table, or may not return that field in the dataset for use in a post query comparison. As a less secure alternative, it's possible to query the Agent table for the id and an indication that this user is an active member, essentially ignoring the password. Method 3 We offer two 'Single Sign On' methods, which are especially good for MLSs that have a site license where every member has free access to Cloud CMA. In this scenario, users cannot log in directly at cloudcma.com, but instead must first log into their MLS system and click on a button or link to access Cloud CMA. We have our own 'homebrew' form of SSO where parameters are passed in the url - the MLS code, the users id, a secure hash, and a timestamp. Details of this algorithm can be provided on request. We have several MLSs using this method, it works well, and it's simple to implement. We also support the SAML standard for SSO and are currently SAML certified with one of the major MLS vendors. We are set up to easily add other SAML providers. SSO works especially well when the MLS implements the API for passing listing numbers to automatically create reports for listings the user has currently selected. This 7

8 allows for a deep integration between MLS system and Cloud CMA, requiring no additional login by the user and making it seem like one seamless system. Pro: The MLS has complete control over this user not only being able to utilize MLS data in Cloud CMA, but even having rights to access Cloud CMA at all. The user can be cut off at any time using the normal deactivation process built into the MLS workflow - if they can't access the MLS system, they can't access Cloud CMA. Con: The MLS needs to set up the link to Cloud CMA within the MLS system. Cloud CMA RETS Queries Cloud CMA allows agents to create CMA, Buyer Tour, and Property reports. We DO NOT download the entire MLS and keep it synced in servers on our site. The agents enter criteria and we do real-time RETS searches to download data from the MLS at that moment in time. We basically do three types of searches in Cloud CMA: 1. Mls nums search - single or multiple mls nums at a time. Very straightforward, simple search. 2. Address search - usually we have to break an address down into street num, street name, city, state, zip and do the search. Also very straightforward. 3. Lat/Lon range search - basically a Latitude range and a Longitude range forming a rectangular proximity search area around a given subject property. This is a more complex query, and I've seen it trip up RETS servers in two ways: The latitude and longitude fields on some servers are not indexed, even though these are simple decimal values and are very useful search fields. Because the longitude in the US is a negative number, to search a range you end up with this funky double negative DMQL syntax that looks like this: (LONGITUDE= ),(LATITUDE= ) That can break the parser on some RETS servers. We have come up with a fairly simple way around this on RETS servers in the past. Assuming that the RETS parser is simply querying a View in your database, create a new field called "ABSLONGITUDE" in your View which contains the absolute value of the longitude. On our side, we just set a flag to query that new field instead and the query above becomes: (ABSLONGITUDE= ),(LATITUDE= ) That works for us and is typically pretty easy to implement on the server side. This method of real-time searches is more secure, since we do not have all the MLS data replicated on our servers, and provides less load on the RETS server, since we are only searching an extremely small subset of the MLS daily. 8

9 W&R Studios Company Contact Sheet Company Name: Woolley Robertson Group Inc. dba W&R Studios Mailing Address: 123 Main Street Suite 201 Huntington Beach, CA Main Office Telephone Technical Contact Person: Dan Woolley Mobile: Facsimile: IP Address Range for computers accessing MLS and RETS servers: URL of site displaying data Administrative Contract Greg Robertson Person: Mobile: Facsimile: