« Competition Tribunal Proceedings | Main | Commissioner: 1 TREB: 0 »
Competition Commissioner vs TREB
The Commissioner of Competition's case against the Toronto Real Estate Board (TREB) began on September 10 before the Competition Tribunal. The Competition Bureau is seeking to ensure new and innovative real estate brokerage services are accessible for consumers through the Internet by prohibiting anti-competitive practices by TREB.
In May 2011, the Bureau announced that it had filed an application with the Tribunal seeking to prohibit TREB's has anti-competitive rules that restrict how its member agents provide information, such as previous listings and previous sale prices, to customers, thereby denying agents the ability to introduce innovative real estate brokerage services using the Internet, such as through Virtual Office Websites (VOWs).
VOWs are password-protected websites that permit customers to search a full inventory of listings containing up-to-date data online, before making the decision to tour a home or attend an open house. This enables customers to be more selective and focused, and agents to spend less time trying to find an appropriate property for a specific customer.
"Many real estate agents are eager to offer new, innovative services for consumers through the Internet," said Melanie Aitken, Commissioner of Competition, "but TREB's anti-competitive behaviour is essentially restricting potential homebuyers and sellers from taking advantage of a greater range of service and pricing options when making one of the most significant financial transactions of their lives."
With approximately 35,000 members, TREB is the largest real estate board in Canada. It owns and operates the Toronto Multiple Listing Service (MLS) system, which contains current property listings and historical information about residential real estate purchases and sales in Toronto and the surrounding area. The majority of local real estate transactions make use of the Toronto MLS system, which is an essential tool for agents to help customers buy and sell homes. It is much more detailed than what is available on public sites, such as Realtor.ca. For example, the Toronto MLS system contains data about previous listings and previous sale prices.
While agents can provide detailed MLS listing information not available on Realtor.ca to customers by hand, mail, fax, or e-mail, TREB's anti-competitive practices effectively prevent agents from providing similar MLS listing information to customers via VOWs. As a result, there are currently no VOWs operating in the Toronto real estate market that enable customers to search a full inventory of listings.
The Competition Bureau, as an independent law enforcement agency, ensures that Canadian businesses and consumers prosper in a competitive and innovative marketplace.
Toronto Star article on first day of Competition Tribunal proceedings »
September 11, 2012 in Competition Tribunal | Permalink
TrackBack
TrackBack URL for this entry:
https://www.typepad.com/services/trackback/6a00d8341c51e453ef017744a718aa970d
Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Competition Commissioner vs TREB:
Comments
this post is really great since it has been helpful and at the same time, informative. Really worth the read! I do hope that you'd still keep on posting such informative articles like this. :)
Posted by: Anastasia L. Thelusma | Oct 15, 2012 8:26:28 AM
I'd really like TREB to open its real estate history transaction records. This is very helpfully for buyers and sellers for comparation.
Posted by: Hongfa Wu | Sep 26, 2012 3:26:09 PM
Great reporting, thanks for the info!
Posted by: Westwood Plateau Realtor | Sep 11, 2012 2:41:32 PM
I would like to know about the details such as time period and the rate of interest demanded on these fore closures in case if we are unable to pay the amount in th prescribed time period.
Posted by: Delay Foreclosure Auction | Sep 11, 2012 6:30:02 AM
The comments to this entry are closed.
