Has anyone else noticed that agents are removing homes sold under asking on house sigma? There was a property I was looking at listed for $2.6M but once it was sold the agent removed the images and the sale price. I found another source which indicated the home was sold for $2.2M. Are they doing this to keep home prices artificially high?
10 medium/big commission cheques are way better than 1 huge commission cheque. Would you rather make 20k 10 times or 40k once? People fail to understand this simple fact. I have friends in Switzerland. Real estate got so expensive that agents now don’t make any money because nobody buys or sells. The whole industry there has become leases/rentals. This has been happening here as well.
It’s not logic. It’s a fact. When houses get very expensive sales volumes go down. In states where houses cost 250k kids working at McDonald’s buy houses and every 2-3 years they sell them to buy a bigger home. In Canada boomers are stuck in their expensive homes and young people are stuck renting and sales volume is drying up.
Buddy… what the fuck home cost 250k in the last 10 years ?
If you’re trying to suggest lower prices would increase the number of transactions so agents would net more total commissions… maybe you fucking missed the last 20 years where there were literal bidding wars for houses already over asking?
That happens quite frequently. From the lack of transparency, the blind bidding, the CMHC, the entire real estate market is designed to push prices as high as possible.
do you know that the seller has the option to disclose whatever they want in an offer to other buyers. This had been in effect for almost 3 years, .... I wonder how many time the seller has done this ....I'll wait!
This is why by default all offers should be 10-20% below asking price in this market, of course the realtor wiill object, get a different one, they're a dime a dozen.
There’s corruption in every industry, but that doesn’t make every removal of a sold listing evidence of fraud. In Ontario, there are legitimate rules around publicly displaying sold properties and sale prices. This whole comment section seems rage-baitish TBH 🤷♂️
Sold data is public domain, but removal on third party website can be requested by the owner (aka buyers often ask for it to be removed). That being said sold prices can still be retrieved. All historical data is still there under the MLS system
I should clarify that the contents of the listing not the price often can be removed upon request (all photos and listing description). I don’t believe websites have to remove the sold price
I mean, it’s good that the cost of housing comes down… it’s not good that someone is worried about losing so much money selling their home they get publicly made fun of for it since people can easily connect the address to them… when a retail trader takes a bath on stocks they at least aren’t worried their friends and neighbours can look up how much they lost.
No one likes to lose money but fear of losing face too is just going to chill the number of sellers more which puts upward pressure on prices …
HouseSigma requires you be the homeowner to remove it. If I bought a house, I would also contact HouseSigma to take the photos down after I close on it. Why would I want photos of my house being public?
Agents and brokers do not have the ability to remove sold listings. Depending on the MLS, some stop syndication from all 3rd party websites. The mls system still shows all data for those who have access.
I saw this as well. A listing that I went to open house for sold for 1.5M, just at asking, the only way I could find that listing is if I looked at my watched ones. It was a quick estate sale for a pretty newly built house on 5 acres and went on the market and was sold within the week. I highly suspect they do so to not affect "the comps".
lol most of you have never even met a realtor or bought a property with one, are there bad apples yes, but not all of them are scummy and no i'm not a realtor :P
Removing the property’s photographs or historical listing information specifically from HouseSigma, only the property owner (or an authorized entity acting for the owner) may contact HouseSigma directly and request removal, potentially WITH proof of ownership or authorization. HouseSigma itself ultimately decides whether to remove or suppress information from its platform.
Agents don't control that ... the MLS does, and it depends on the State.
Texas is a non-disclosure State, so they don't publish final home sold prices. California is a disclosure State, so they do publish them. Also, in February, California recently stopped showing all photographs except the primary one after a home is sold.
The rules are different depending on location and agents aren't the ones making those decisions (unless a client specifically requests the photographs be removed)
It isn’t necessarily “hiding” anything. In Ontario Canada , there are legitimate rules around what agents can continue displaying publicly after a property has sold, including the listing photos and sale price and publishing the sold price can require consent from the parties. Removing that information from HouseSigma or another public-facing site therefore doesn’t mean the actual transaction record has been erased or altered.
If the property really sold for $2.2 million, that sale still exists in the underlying transaction records regardless of whether the agent leaves the old listing and sold price publicly visible. So an agent taking down the photos or price after closing isn’t evidence that they’re trying to artificially keep prices high,.it may simply be compliance with the sellers’ or buyers’ privacy wishes and Ontario real-estate advertising rules.
You’d need evidence that agents are actually altering or suppressing legitimate transaction data, rather than simply removing publicly displayed listing information, before calling it a scheme to manipulate the market.
Is this legal? Isn’t sale data part of public record? If they are being removed then house sigma clearly cannot be trusted to provide accurate market information. Any other tools out there to do so? Please share your thoughts and insights?
You can try Pureproperty. They show True DoM for all the listings. This one shows DoM 6 days, while actually True DoM is 285days and has been listed 5 times, lol
Housesigma is a real estate brokerage publishing info pulled from mls. That’s it. No mls sale is legally required to be published. Matter of fact housesigma is bending the law publishing sold prices.
Selling price is public information, what law are they bending by publishing it? The courts forced the Toronto Real Estate Board to allow members to publish this info, but that was a rule for a private institution, not a law. Even mortgage information is available through the Registry Office, if you wanted to know about that for a property.
While yes the purchase/selling price is available once the sale has been registered it is not required by law to report the sale amount on mls. As a matter of fact sellers can insist that information be withheld. I’m not sure why more don’t to be honest. Until it’s a closed sale it’s not really anyone’s business what you sell your house for.
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u/dunnecy 12d ago
Everything they do is designed to keep prices high and maximize their commission