by Taylor Anderson | Jul 8, 2025 | Industry, News Feed
Mysterious newcomer plans to generate buyer and seller leads quickly after teaming up with Gannett Company to display listings across its news sites.
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A newcomer to the so-called portal wars announced a major partnership on Monday. A new portal named addressUSA has teamed up with Gannett, one of the nation’s largest news publishers, to provide another space for consumers to view home listings and generate referrals for agents.
AddressUSA, an upstart attempt to go national with a platform that has been tested in a few regional markets, would tap into Gannett’s readership as part of the years-long agreement, the companies announced.
With the move, addressUSA joins a crowded group of portals offering consumers a space to view listings online. By teaming up with Gannett, the company lands an audience that could make it a serious competitor, and Gannett gains a new revenue stream via referrals.
“Real estate information and tools are important for our audience of 195 million average monthly unique visitors as they search for a home to buy or sell or simply want to explore properties as real estate enthusiasts,” said Mike Reed, Gannett Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. “AddressUSA will enable us to drive further audience growth and engagement, enhancing the overall experience for readers to be inspired by what’s available in their local market.”
AddressUSA now becomes the latest competitor looking to go to battle for consumer attention with behemoths like Zillow, Realtor.com, Redfin and Homes.com, all of them much larger and more established brands in the space. Rather than leaning on heavy financing, addressUSA appears to be leaning into media partnerships to help it gain momentum in the crowded market.
It appears the announcement was made while addressUSA was still rolling out its website and features, as the website still showed errors and other glitches hours after the announcement, and there was no readily available place to direct questions.
The platform has several articles that were posted in recent weeks and which appear to have been written primarily by artificial intelligence.
It’s not immediately clear whether the company will be available nationwide, either, as the company provides a list of broker information in 27 states.
It appears the platform is using the broker services of a company called RE50, LLC, which offers licensing compliance services for real estate platforms operating in multiple states. That company was founded by Lee Leslie, a real estate legal expert who has served in C-suite and founder roles for companies like LendingTree Loans, HouseTech, Ten-X and Auction.com.
The news release announcing the partnership with Gannett quoted Paul Huntsman as chairman of AddressUSA. It is not yet clear if that’s the same Paul Huntsman who previously owned the Salt Lake Tribune, Utah’s largest newspaper.
Huntsman recently founded the Coronado News outside San Diego and stepped down from his role as board chair of the Tribune. On the top menu of Coronado News is a link to a platform called addressSD, a portal for homes in southern California.
“We are excited to partner with Gannett and the USA TODAY Network launching a groundbreaking real estate marketplace hub for homebuyers, sellers, real estate agents and vendors to connect,” Huntsman said in the release. “Gannett’s unrivaled reach at both local and national levels will allow us to engage with a broad and powerful audience.”
Seven of the eight featured agents listed on the website are based in Arizona. The eighth is in San Diego.
One of those featured agents is Realty One Group’s John Reckard. He said he signed up to be affiliated with the new company as an alternative to the other major portals and to begin receiving referrals.
“I haven’t had much success with it yet,” Reckard said, “but the launch just happened.”
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by Taylor Anderson | Jul 7, 2025 | Industry, News Feed
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By the time his term ends, Kevin Sears will have been the longest-serving president of the National Association of Realtors in more than a century.
His term started under the cloud of a jury verdict that upended the real estate industry, as well as other turmoil that engulfed the 1.5-million-member organization itself. And when he took the reins in January 2024, NAR was negotiating the terms of a settlement agreement that would cost the group $418 million and lead to practice changes that would divide the industry.
Still, Sears made inroads with a U.S. Department of Justice that some in the industry believed had grown more hostile toward real estate during President Joe Biden’s administration. He met twice with the DOJ to try and reach a mutual agreement on changes the regulator might want to see for real estate. And he delivered the message to agents and brokers that the DOJ wanted agents to be loudly pro-consumer.
It’s been a tightrope to walk. NAR is both seeking more meetings with the DOJ, and has tried fighting the feds all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Sears’ nearly two-year term won’t end until Kevin Brown becomes president in January. Until then, Sears says he’s got more work to do. Some of the biggest players in the industry remain divided against each other and against NAR itself. NAR is still looking for clarity from the DOJ. Lawsuits are being filed all the time.
Sears spoke with Inman about some of the biggest issues that have arisen through his term, and ahead of his scheduled appearance at Inman Connect San Diego later this month.
Below is a transcript of the conversation, edited for clarity and brevity.
Inman: Compass said that they’re not going to view any national NAR policy as binding for them, which followed Howard Hanna saying basically the same thing a couple months ago. What do you make of this statement from Compass that the Clear Cooperation Policy isn’t binding?
Kevin Sears: Yeah, so this is nothing new or shocking from Robert Reffkin. He’s been talking a lot about CCP for as long as I’ve been president. I’ll just put it to you that way.
This does follow Howard Hanna as well. I know you’ve been going around the country meeting with brokers and trying to hear about their concerns. Are there any potential changes that might come out of, I guess, both those brokerages’ responses?
The beauty of our governance structure is that both of those brokerages have members that actively volunteer with the National Association of Realtors. And if there’s going to be changes to policy, then it’s the membership that can effectuate that change. So we have processes in place that can be utilized.
The only other thing I’ll say is that we have closely looked at and monitored the policies, especially in light of everything that’s happened with our association over the last few years with litigation — including the fact that last summer, early fall, [NAR CEO] Nykia [Wright] and our general counsel engaged outside counsel to review all of our policies, rules, our Code of Ethics, our constitution, our bylaws and say, ‘OK, where are areas of concern or potential litigation? And what do we need to do in order to mitigate that risk?’
So, we’ve got the structure in place. We’re doing a full and thorough analysis and, in fact, making changes as we need to through the process.
How do you feel about the final updated Clear Cooperation Policy? Were you happy with where that ended up?
With the policy, am I happy with it? I’m happy that we were able to meet with the various stakeholder groups, have the conversation and come up with a policy that gives options to the selling consumer. Ultimately, what we need to do is look and say, ‘What’s best for the consumer?’ And the policy should follow that.
NAR President Kevin Sears speaks at Inman Connect Las Vegas in 2024. Photo by AJ Canaria Creative Services.
Zillow then came up with its own policy that, in some ways, maybe moved it more toward being like a national MLS. Zillow is saying, ‘If you want to be on Zillow, you have to put it into the MLS and therefore on our site.’ What did you make of their update to their listing policy?
With regard to portals — and you said one specifically, I won’t — the portals and decisions they’re making, that’s just showing that this is a free market and that businesses get to decide what they want to do or how they want to operate. It’s just the market forces doing what they’re supposed to do.
And ultimately, I’ll go back to the consumer. What’s best for the consumer? What’s best for the consumer is to have full access to the most accurate data that’s out there. I always think that with that and the consumer being fully informed, then that’s a good thing.
I saw an update from NAR midyear that you met with the DOJ. There were some apparently pretty big meetings with DOJ attorneys. At the time, you hadn’t met with [DOJ antitrust chief Jonathan] Kanter’s replacement, Gail Slater. Any update on that? Have you had further meetings or conversations with the DOJ?
No, not that I’m aware of. Now, remember, Taylor, I told you I was out of the country. So I don’t know if our attorneys have had any conversation since we were in Washington, D.C., with the Department of Justice.
But I do know that before Gail Slater was put in position and confirmed for the job, we had reached out. I believe shortly after she was confirmed, we reached out. But as far as I know, we have not gotten anything back concrete to be able to to open up the dialogue with the new folks in there.
But as I said at midyear, and as I said before that, I do look forward to the opportunity to continue the conversation because ultimately, if we can come to a meeting of the minds and get some quote-unquote world peace, when it comes to real estate, I think that would be a good thing for everyone involved.
If you get Gail on the line and you’re able to tell her how the past year was between the DOJ and NAR or the industry at large, what would you tell her? And what do you expect, at least in terms of the tone or tenor of the new administration and the DOJ?
I’m not sure that I would go in talking about what had happened, because if we want to move forward, we need to look forward. If there were questions that were asked, I would certainly answer them. But what we need to do is say, what does the administration want the real estate industry [and] real estate market to look like? And how can we work and strive towards that together? That’s it for me.
I just want our members to not have to worry about a cloud over their shoulder. Let’s give them a little breathing room, a little clarity, let them go out and do their job and serve the consumer like they have been for as long as I’ve been involved.
Just to close out that topic. Do you feel like you have any clarity at this point from the DOJ or from the administration? Like, whether there are any other rules you feel like should be changed or they want to be changed so that you can remove that cloud — or so the industry could remove the cloud for itself?
So not having any conversation or in-depth conversation at this point, the short answer is no. But if you look at what’s happened in the first six months of the administration, the Department of Justice in the Nosalek case, the PIN case in Boston, apparently seemed to be satisfied with the settlement. And the terms of the settlement pretty much mirrored the Sitzer | Burnett case.
And I do know that the [Civil Investigative Demands or CIDs] have been lifted off of some of the MLSs that received them over the past year to 18 months about the commingling rules. So are we getting a little more clarity? Is there going to be a change in approach and priorities? Maybe. But until we actually meet and have conversations, I’m not one to speculate on what that would be or what that would look like.
I will just say I’m cautiously optimistic and I do look forward to the opportunity to be able to have those conversations if permitted.
You’re the longest serving NAR president in at least 100 years. How would you rate your term so far?
In college undergrad, I was a history major. What I’ll tell you based on what I learned there, me judging my tenure as president is irrelevant. There are others that can do that.
You know, history will be able to show what was accomplished in 2024 and in 2025. With that said, I’ll just tell you, it’s been an honor to be able to serve the association, and to do the hard work that needed to be done and to help NAR position itself and chart the course for the next 100 years.
Any highlights from this year and a half that come to mind that you’re most proud of?
Several highlights for sure. Being able to represent our 1.4 million to 1.5 million Realtor members, not once but twice with the Department of Justice. That’s certainly the highlight because, at least in the past decade or 15 years, we haven’t had sitting leadership meet with the Department of Justice. And we had several members of the leadership team there. So that was a highlight.
Having Nykia agree to stay on as our permanent CEO was certainly a highlight. Being able to work with our finance committee and budget committee, being able to provide to the directors two years in a row a balanced budget, that’s a highlight.
There’s a very simple question that I ask myself and sometimes say it out loud for the people that have to vote on something: Is this the best thing for the members? And I can honestly say that the hard decisions become easy when you realize it’s the best thing for the members. I think that we’ve done well by the vast majority of the membership over the past year and a half.
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by Taylor Anderson | Jul 2, 2025 | Industry, News Feed
“Chairman Powell needs to be investigated by Congress immediately,” the FHFA director said in a statement on Wednesday. Pulte and President Donald Trump have been trying to pressure Powell to resign amid high interest rates.
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The director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency continued his war on Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell on Wednesday when he called on Congress to investigate Powell.
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In a statement posted on the social media platform X, Pulte asked Congress to look for political bias and deception from Powell. Pulte appeared to suggest that President Donald Trump would be justified in firing Powell, a move that is legally difficult.
The law that created the Fed says that members of its board of governors can only be removed before the end of their terms “for cause.”
Pulte apparently alluded to a recent report in the New York Post that an ongoing renovation of the Fed’s headquarters in Washington, D.C., was overly costly.
“I am asking Congress to investigate Chairman Jerome Powell, his political bias, and his deceptive Senate testimony, which is enough to be removed ‘for cause,’” Pulte wrote in his statement.
“Jerome Powell’s $2.5B in capitalizations of Building Renovation Scandal stinks to high heaven, and he lied when asked about the specifics before Congress,” Pulte said in the statement. “This is nothing short of malfeasance and is worthy of ‘for cause.’”
A spokesperson for the Federal Reserve Board declined to comment on Pulte’s allegations.
Powell, who Trump appointed to lead the Fed in 2017 during his first term as president, has said the central bank’s policies are based solely on economic data and its dual mandate of maximizing employment while keeping inflation in check.
Pulte’s statement wasn’t formally released on the FHFA website.
“As Senator Cynthia Lummis said, ‘He [Chairman Powell] made a number of factually inaccurate statements to the Committee regarding the Fed’s plush private dining room and elevator, skylights, water features, and roof terrace,’ and that ‘this is typical of the mismanagement and ‘don’t bother me’ attitude that Chair Powell has always shown.’”
Pulte and Trump have ratcheted up their campaign to pressure Powell and the governors of the Federal Reserve Board to lower the federal funds rate or resign. The battle ramped up after the board held rates steady at its June 19 meeting.
Powell has said policymakers need more time to assess the impacts of the Trump administration’s policies in areas including tariffs, immigration, taxes and regulation.
Although the Fed has direct control over short-term interest rates, mortgage rates are determined by investor demand for mortgage-backed securities (MBS), which fund most home loans. The last time the Fed cut rates — by a full percentage point in September, November and December — mortgage rates went up.
Editor’s note: This story has been updated to note that the Federal Reserve Board declined to comment on Pulte’s allegations, and with additional context on Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s policy stance.
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by Taylor Anderson | Jul 1, 2025 | Industry, News Feed
The 32,000-member Northwest Multiple Listing Service wrote in a new legal filing that Compass “cannot have it both ways” by receiving listings via the MLS while holding half of its own listings privately
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The Northwest Regional Multiple Listing Service said that Compass is trying to have it “both ways” when it comes to receiving access to listings in the MLS while building its own private network of listings, according to a new legal filing.
Compass filed the lawsuit against Washington-based Northwest MLS in April, calling the multiple listing service a “monopolist.” The suit was one of several escalations made by Compass — others included criticism on social media — in its quest to pursue a marketing strategy that includes holding listings within its own Private Exclusives network before potentially adding them to the MLS at a later date.
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However, such listings violate NWMLS rules that are in place to ensure transparent access to the broadest pool of listings, the MLS wrote in response to Compass’ complaint. NWMLS also asked a judge to dismiss Compass’ suit.
“NWMLS has no antitrust or common-law obligation to promote Compass’ exclusionary, free-rider strategy,” the MLS wrote. “NWMLS’ rules were designed to prohibit conduct like Compass’, which destroys competition in the real estate market, harms consumers, and contravenes NWMLS’ founding purpose.”
Among those rules is a requirement that the MLS’ 32,000 member brokers who get access to competitors’ listings also submit their own.
“That requirement ensures that all members have fair access to each other’s listings and eliminates the possibility that one member may extract value from others without a corresponding contribution for that value,” NWMLS wrote.
The MLS specifically pointed to Compass’ 3-Phased Marketing Strategy, an approach that involves testing a listing off-MLS to gain insights on pricing, the home itself and buyer interest. If homes don’t sell while in the private status, the listing enters “coming soon” status, followed by broader public marketing on the MLS as an active listing.
Nearly half of the brokerage’s listings outside of Washington in the first quarter started as Private Exclusives, while most (94 percent) eventually went onto the open market, the company said in its complaint.
NWMLS wrote that the strategy was designed “to steer those listings to a Compass-represented buyer.”
“Compass, however, cannot have it both ways,” NWMLS wrote.
In footnotes within the legal filing, NWMLS called into question the private nature of Compass’ Private Exclusives.
“The only thing ‘private’ about the Private Exclusive phase is that Compass disseminates the listing to its 34,000 ‘nationwide’ agents and their ‘millions of buyers,’ but not to non-Compass agents, thus contradicting the Complaint’s conclusory assertions about owner security and privacy,” NWMLS wrote. “Compass wants its agents’ ‘millions of buyers’ to know about the listing, but not competing NWMLS member firms, and their potential buyers.”
After a behind-the-scenes back-and-forth between NWMLS and Compass, the MLS cut off Compass’ license to the MLS’ IDX data feed for two days in April.
“The suspension of the IDX data feed merely meant that, for two days, Compass could not transfer other members’ listings from NWMLS’ database to Compass’ public facing website,” NWMLS wrote.
The MLS asked the court to dismiss the case with prejudice, meaning that, if the judge agrees, Compass couldn’t refile the lawsuit.
Compass is now fighting a multi-front battle against organizations and companies that are enforcing rules that would undermine the company’s private listings strategy.
Last week, it filed suit against Zillow, the largest real estate portal, seeking to block the company’s policy banning private listings that have been marketed publicly.
Read NWMLS full filing here:
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by Taylor Anderson | Jul 1, 2025 | Industry, News Feed
Celebrity agent Mauricio Umansky, who has targeted the National Association of Realtors’ dominance over agents and the rules governing real estate, heads back to court.
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Celebrity broker and The Agency founder Mauricio Umansky has revived a simmering lawsuit that takes aim at rules created by the National Association of Realtors, arguing the rules help maintain unfair dominance over the nation’s multiple listing services.
The new lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court of Southern California, boils down to a few key arguments:
- Umansky alleges NAR controls competition in the residential real estate industry by controlling a large network of MLSs in the country.
- Namely, the Clear Cooperation Policy that requires listings to be placed on an MLS within one business day limits competition from companies seeking to offer private listings that are marketed outside the MLS.
- The policy stymied efforts by would-be competitors, like Umansky’s ThePLS.com, to give brokerages a new way to discreetly market homes for sale.
“The surge in consumer demand for pocket listings, and the rise of a listing network to market pocket listings effectively, was a competitive threat to the viability of the NAR-affiliated MLS system,” ThePLS.com wrote in its complaint, filed overnight on Tuesday. “These market changes also threatened NAR’s ability to control competition in the residential real estate brokerage industry.”
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The federal antitrust lawsuit keeps pressure on NAR and its affiliated MLSs, and shows that the industry will remain engaged in a fierce debate over the rules — especially those governing private listings — that will guide the next chapter of the real estate industry.
Compass, the No. 1 largest brokerage by sales volume, last week filed a lawsuit against Zillow, the nation’s largest real estate portal by unique visitors. Compass is taking aim at updates to Zillow’s policies that require listings to be filed on the MLS and therefore on Zillow within one business day.
Compass is making the claim that Zillow is a monopoly and that its policy is anticompetitive because it prevents the company from growing its network of Private Exclusive listings, which are homes for sale and only accessible through a Compass agent. The network itself is marketed on Compass’ website, which is a violation of Zillow’s new standards.
The newly filed lawsuit keeps a target squarely on NAR and the Clear Cooperation Policy.
“Through the Clear Cooperation Policy, NAR and the MLS conspirators eliminated the possibility of a more competitive future in the market for residential real estate listing network services,” ThePLS.com wrote in the complaint. “A once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for competition in a monopolized market has been lost. NAR’s conduct has harmed competition and consumers, and is illegal.”
What is NAR saying?
The new filing actually represents the refiling of a case that Umansky and NAR fought over beginning in 2020, shortly after NAR adopted its Clear Cooperation Policy. NAR said that PLS had walked away from the negotiating table before filing its suit overnight, and it defended its Clear Cooperation Policy.
“NAR and PLS were in discussions to extend this agreement until PLS ceased to engage,” an NAR spokesperson said in a statement to Inman. “The Clear Cooperation Policy promotes transparency and competition in the real estate marketplace while still providing home sellers and their agents the option to list their property as an office exclusive.”
More context
After years of debate, NAR opted to keep Clear Cooperation in March, but at the same time rolled out a new policy to allow for the delayed marketing of a listing without violating the rule.
The update was an effort to balance criticisms of the policy, but it received mixed reviews among industry insiders.
ThePLS.com filed it’s first lawsuit against NAR in 2020, shortly after the trade organization first adopted the Clear Cooperation Policy.
NAR and ThePLS.com previously reached an agreement that dismissed the case but kept open the possibility of it being filed again at a later date.
“Where we landed is that we gave them a tolling agreement on the statute of limitations to give us time to figure out whether or not we were amenable to repealing the Clear Cooperation Policy,” former NAR outside legal counsel Ethan Glass said at a hearing in 2024.
Over the years, Umansky has challenged NAR in other ways as well.
Early last year, he was part of a team that launched the American Real Estate Association, a group that intends to compete with NAR.
“Right now I don’t feel like anybody is caring; we’re in a lot of trouble,” Umansky said at the time, arguing at another point, “We need better advocacy, we need better lobbying, we need to make sure we’re taken care of.”
Update: This post was updated after publication to add additional clarity.
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