Please help us help you! MLS® staff have noticed an increase in the number of deficient listing contracts submitted to the Board. These deficiencies are causing delays, since these contracts are NOT being processed and are being sent back to the brokerage to be dealt with. This typically means that the listing agent must return to the client for signatures and/or initials to the changes, which causes further delays and does not convey professionalism.
Watch for these things:
- Listings submitted on old versions of the Multiple Listing Contract and Authority to Lease Contract will not be accepted by the Board. We are seeing contracts from 2014! The most current versions of the forms are on WEBForms®.
- Missing dates on contracts.
- Incorrect dates. (e. g. The listing could not have been signed in 1974.)
- Double-check the address with your clients before leaving your client’s property. If the house address door says 14326, then the contract should read 14326, not 14236… typo, but the contract would need to be returned for a correction, delaying the listing.
- Make sure there is a price on the listing.
- The PID# and complete Legal Description must be there.
- Legal Descriptions are being copied from historical listings as far back as 1986! If the legal description is in this format “LT.396,SEC.26,TP.15,PL.4043*PART NE1/4,” (notice the asterisk right in the middle of the description) you’ve likely copied from a listing from back in the Stellar days. Use best practices, pull the title, check the legals on it. Paragon Tax and the City sites are also far better sources than another agent’s 1986 listing.
- Double-check the commission. For example, it can’t possibly be 2223% of the selling price of the property. And “2500” or “3.22 on 1st 100,000” is not clear enough, where are the $ or % signs?
- Designated Agent Line 7A must have the names of all agents designated by the Brokerage for that listing, not the name of the Brokerage.
- The Sellers’, REALTOR®’s and Manager’s signatures are all required on the Listing Contract.
- The Schedule A must be initialed by the Seller(s).
- Check the Realtor remarks for “No Show” periods. They can only be held off for seven calendar days from the Effective date of the listing. We are seeing a lot which exceed that period, which means the listing cannot be processed.
- Any direction from the Seller about a “Delay in Offers Presentation” must be in writing. The details of which must be noted in the REALTOR® Remarks of the listing.
Remember:
- ALL corrections on the Listing Contract must be initialed.
- If corrections/additions are required, ensure the entire listing is resubmitted with the deficient cover sheet the MLS® department sends out. Make sure it’s the Broker-initialed copy that gets resubmitted to the Board with those corrections. (The box “Brokerage Approval” on page 3 or 6 of the Listing Contract must be signed by the Broker.)
- A final but very important request, BEFORE the listing is sent to the Board for processing or Broker loaded, please ensure you have conducted a Title Search. You should be conducting the search prior to, or at the time of taking the listing. The Board does not require a copy of the search to be sent with the listing documents but you should be uploading it to the Associated Documents tab on Paragon®, within 24 hours of the listing being active on MLS®.
Though submitting a listing through REALTOR® Load (ADT) will prevent some of these deficiencies, others still require the diligence of the Listing Agent and the Broker.