This week, Realtors Property Resource® released version 1.13 which includes some very powerful new enhancements, such as a new mapping interface and a completely redesigned reports engine. Here are some of the highlights:

New Mapping Interface

In version 1.13 we have converted the technology that powers RPR maps so they no longer require the Silverlight plugin. This enhancement means that devices that do not support Silverlight, such as the iPad, will now be full compatibility with RPR maps.  In this switchover, we also added new map tools and overlays, such as a Drive Time calculation tool. This allows REALTORS® to choose a point on the map and then view properties that are within a specific timed drive of that location.  Also you will notice the newly added Year Built overlay enhancement which will enable REALTORS® to view the age of the housing stock in a specific area.

New Reports Interface

On your next visit to the RPR reports generation page, you will notice that we have implemented a completely new interface making the report creation process much more flexible. Now you will have more control over what appears in the reports. We have also added new content to the Property Reports. Now it will include school facts and reviews for properties where schools are available in the MLS record. Another valuable benefit to this upgrade is that REALTORS® will have a new timer and queued process, helping to better estimate of how long your report will take to generate.

RPR Commercial Beta

In this release, we are also pleased to see the culmination of over a year’s work and coordination with RPR’s Development Team and Commercial practitioners from around the country who spent countless hours assisting with this new commercial application.

RPR will begin Beta testing this application with Charlotte Regional Commercial Board of REALTORS® this week, and is contracted with seven other markets to participate in beta testing throughout the summer.  Watch the RPR blog for more news about the RPR Commercial Application in the coming months.

For a video overview of all the new features, visit this post.

Sincerely,

Dale L. Ross

Realtors Property Resource® unleashed version 1.13 with some powerful new enhancements, including a new mapping interface and completely redesigned reports engine.

Download the release notes for RPR v1.13

We are pleased to announce the addition of Veronica McManus and Allen Wright to the RPR team. Each will be responsible for building and maintaining strong relationships in their respective markets, working closely with local and state Association and MLS staff to offer communication, training and support systems designed to develop and deliver programs to help your members make the most of the RPR system.

Veronica McManus

As Market Manager for the New England markets, Veronica McManus will cover Connecticut, Rhode Island, Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts and Maine. Veronica has impressive list of accomplishments which make her an asset to the RPR team. Veronica comes to us from the REALTOR® community where she has been an agent, continuing ed instructor and extremely active with her local Association and is the President-elect for the Massachusetts State Chapter of Women’s Council of REALTORS®.

Allen Wright

Allen Wright joins RPR as the Market Manager for New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado, Utah, Nevada, Wyoming, Idaho and Montana. Allen has a tremendous list of accomplishments to his credit, including obtaining his MBA in the top ranked MAYS School of Business. Also, Allen launched the nationally recognized business planning tool CreateAPlan—enabling commissioned professionals to design a business plan focusing on the costs and activities associated with meeting a specific income goal. This tool was accepted by CRS and awarded the Quality Tested Certificate. CreateAPlan is used by thousands of real estate professionals, in 2005 was acquired by RealtyU, Inc.

For more on both Veronica and Allen visit the RPR Industry Relations team page.

In anticipation of RPR’s upcoming Commercial Beta Launch in May, RPR has recently hired Emily Line as Director of Commercial Services.  In this position Emily’s first responsibility will be to assist in the management and launch of RPR’s Commercial Application to the upcoming Beta Test markets, and mange that process throughout the summer.  Emily will be responsible for creating outreach strategies to Commercial MLSs, Commercial Information Exchanges (CIEs) and REALTOR® Associations in order to deliver the  RPR’s Commercial value proposition.  She will also work closely with RPR Product Team to create specifications for new functionality based upon feedback from users and MLS/CIE Staff.

 ”I’m thrilled to join the RPR team and continue working with commercial members and REALTOR® associations,” Emily said.  ”It’s exciting to take what I’ve learned working with commercial practitioners around the country for the last 5 years and be in the position to connect them with the ultimate REALTOR® benefit they have been asking for — better commercial data through the RPR Commercial initiative!”

Before coming to RPR, Emily managed Development and Outreach for NAR’s Commercial Real Estate Division. Emily’s duties focused on planning for associations that were looking to develop new programs & services or enhance current offerings for commercial members; presentations to REALTOR® members on commercial real estate advocacy efforts, research, education, communications, and technology available through membership; and coaching for Associations wanting to earn NAR’s Commercial Services Accreditation.

RPR Enhanced RPR Blog Released

On Wednesday, we went live with a few enhancements to the RPR blog. Taking feedback from RPR users, our changes focused on reorganization and simplification of the homepage and adjustments to our constituency landing page layout. On the homepage you’ll notice the navigation has been expanded to now offer quick links to our MLS partners map, the MyRPR user stories, and the Agent, Broker, Commercial, MLS, Appraiser and Association landing pages. You will also find easier navigation between the RPR Blog, RPR website, and MyRPR.com, as well as helpful tips provided by RPR users.

On the Agent and Broker landing pages we’ve added some new graphics to highlight important topics, while also incorporating our new RPR calendar to display upcoming training sessions. Soon the calendar will also include live (in-person) classes, and other RPR related events. To see all the new features, go to: blog.narrpr.com.

See Success stories on MyRPR.com

The MyRPR campaign continues to drive inspiring stories. If you haven’t taken the time to see for yourself, please visit the MyRPR site. One such video is from Colin Mullane of Ashland, Oregon. Colin gives and honest and heartfelt review of first learning about RPR, to working with his board and conducting their due diligence to learn more about bring the RPR application to his market.

If you or someone you know has an RPR story they would like to share, please click here and let us know.

RPR and the 100th Association Executives Institute

I had the pleasure of attending the Association Executives Institute (AEI) in Louisville Kentucky this weekend. RPR staff participated in providing valuable information to leadership from around the country on RPR progress, training and support systems, and the upcoming RPR Commercial Beta testing. RPR Industry Relations VP’s Ohan Antebian and Ron France gave updates at both the State CEO Meeting and the 2nd annual “Unassociation” event leading up to AEI. RPR was also pleased to sponsor the AE Luncheon on Monday which included a commemorative gift to the attendees honoring the 100th Anniversary of the AEI. Thanks to everyone who made this year’s AEI meetings such a success.

The 2012 NAR Association Executives Institute (AEI) is being held in Louisville Kentucky on March 16-20. If you’re not already familiar with AEI,  the purpose is to raise Association Executive awareness of real estate industry issues and provides professional development opportunities so that AEs across the country can better serve the REALTOR® organization and its members.  It also marks the 100th anniversary of the AEI Institute.

We will have an RPR exhibit table where we’ll be giving demos of the application and providing valuable updates on RPR features and benefits.  The RPR team attending this year’s conference will include CEO Dale Ross, Senior Vice President-Mona Steen and representing the RPR Industry Relations team will be  Ohan Antebian, Ron France, Ernie Bottom, Kristen Carr, Andrea Goodhart, Kristen Hernandez and Lee Neiman. For more on the IR team, check out the IR team page here.

Also on Saturday, March 17^th, RPR West Region Vice President-Ohan Antebian will be presenting an RPR session to the State Association Executives at 1pm. Ohan’s presentation will be in the Nunn room on the second floor of the Galt Hotel.

If you somehow missed the registration online, you can still register on-site. If you’re not able to attend this year, but would still like to follow along check out the AIEhashtag #AEI2012.

I recently returned from the NAR Issues Conference in Miami, which focuses every year on the legislative challenges to our industry.  Along with discussions on economics and politics, you could hear a growing dialogue regarding the value of listing data, and an increased focus on the syndication, aggregation and redistribution of that data, both authorized and unauthorized.  As a wholly owned subsidiary corporation of the National Association of REALTORS®, RPR is designed to offer a member benefit to all 1,000,000+ REALTORS®, delivering an advanced data platform designed to reinforce the core competence of its members.  As RPR enters its second year of providing this valuable service to members, and given the national discussion taking place on the value and use of property data, it seems appropriate for RPR to participate in that discussion by outlining in simple terms, what RPR is, and is not.

What RPR is:

• NAR’s technology arm of the Second Century Initiatives – Approved by the NAR Board of Directors in 2008, RPR was launched in September 2010 and is currently partnered with over 375 MLSs, representing over 610,000 REALTORS®.
• A trusted and secure steward for your licensed listing data – RPR recently hired a respected third party to conduct an internal security audit using a template designed by the Department of Defense.  No unauthorized or public access means that the REALTOR® is in control of the delivery of RPR reports to the consumer at all levels.
• Owned by REALTORS®, created by REALTORS®, for REALTORS® - Through its Boards, Councils, Task Forces and Work Groups, RPR works daily with over 100 REALTOR® volunteers on current and future features and functionality, policies, and business rules, in order to provide the highest value to NAR’s members.
• Developing products and features for all NAR industry segments
  • Agent Tools - Property, listing, foreclosure, and ownership data, search, reports, investment tools, trends and market statistics, schools, and neighborhood information, all in one place.
  • Broker Tools – Company branding, support for Affiliated Services, data analysis and charting tool, custom-defined market statistics providing agent, office and company level metrics.
  • Commercial Application – Business opportunity analysis, site selection tools, market potential search, consumer trends, and demographic data, with dynamic reporting – Beta testing Q2 2012.
  • Appraiser Tools – Advanced comps selection and adjustment, forms-based analysis, assignment management, and specialized tools for creating and producing neighborhood statistics and commentary.
  • MLS Tools – Deep linking, single sign-on, co-branding, free Public Records API, and integrated rules and policies for reciprocal subscriber agreements.
  • Association Dashboard – Market, county, region or state level access to sales trends, graphs and statistics to create leadership communications and media tools.

What RPR isn’t:

• A listing syndicator - RPR is not a platform for MLSs or their participant brokers to choose where and how to send their data on the Internet.
• A public facing Web site – RPR provides no consumer access, no public Web site, no reverse prospecting, and no push notifications sent to consumers.  The only access is for REALTORS®.  The only way a consumer can receive information from RPR is from a REALTOR® who prints or e-mails a report to a client or customer.
• An MLS – RPR contracts with MLSs to allow the use of their active and historical data to integrate for the benefit of their REALTOR® subscribers and other REALTORS® who are authorized users.  RPR’s contract with MLSs is non-exclusive, and contains a non-compete clause, which prohibits RPR from offering MLS services.
• A competitor to MLSs, Associations, or Broker-provided services or technologies – RPR products and features are built in cooperation with the members they designed to serve.   RPR offers technology features that complement and extend existing systems, including deep-linking, single sign-on and cobranding.

In 2012, RPR will strive to create communication tools and strategies to deliver RPR to all REALTORS®, regardless of MLS affiliation, by creating opportunities with local Associations.  For more information on RPR, go to blog.narrpr.com.

Sincerely,

Dale L. Ross
CEO, Realtors Property Resource

If you would like to review the release notes, please visit our Help Desk.

RPR/NAR BPOR Classes

NAR’s BPOR Certification classes are scheduled around the country in Q1 2012 at the rate of about one class per day. Once the class has been completed and your application has been submitted, you will be placed on a panel to receive BPO orders for your local market. The average amount of orders for students at the end of 2011 was over 17 orders per month. To learn more about this new certification program go to, http://www.bpor.org or to check the amount of available BPO orders for your area, go to: http://bpor.org/benefits. If you’re ready to enroll in the online class, go here.

NAR Continuing Education Classes

NAR has partnered with The CE Shop and Learning Library to submit a three hour course (3 credits) to states across the country for approval. The course is titled, “RPR™: Real-Time Data, Market Knowledge, Informed Consumers” and focuses primarily on understanding automated valuations and how RPR tools and features can enhance knowledge and productivity at market level. Currently, NAR has received approval from Colorado, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, Texas, Utah, and Washington. We expect to receive approval from additional states in the coming weeks. For more information, visit: rpr.me/cecredit.

RPR Training and Support

RPR’s commitment to member support is our top priority in 2012, and we have just added some tremendous resources to help us attain that goal. We are proud to announce the addition of Karen France to the RPR Team as Vice President of Programs and Events. Karen has an impressive resume with the REALTOR® family. Most recently with REBR, Karen provided strategic planning guidance and leadership for REALTORS® in the areas of brokerage profitability, MLS utilization, customer relationship management, technology applications and assisting brokers and agents in understanding the trends and opportunities that are present in today’s changing real estate industry. Karen’s role with RPR will be focused on creating partnerships with local and state associations in order to deliver and support the RPR value proposition to REALTORS® across the country. For more information, visit this blog post.

Sincerely,

Dale L. Ross

CEO-Realtors Property Resource

“Karen is an outstanding, intelligent and charismatic individual who is determined to succeed at anything she attempts. During her 11-year tenure at Real Estate Business Resources, she led a “start-up” company into a profitable and relevant business, serving the needs of real estate brokers and agents throughout Kansas and North America. We are very proud of all her accomplishments and heartily congratulate Karen on her new position with RPR. Her leadership talent will be missed at Real Estate Business Resources (REBR), however, we are proud to see that Karen will continue to serve all REALTORS® on an even larger platform at RPR,” said Sandy Green, Chairman of the Board of Directors, Real Estate Business Resources, Inc.

Karen’s new role with RPR will be focused building partnerships with local and state Associations and MLSs to expand training and communication programs designed to support RPR to NAR’s one million members across the country.

Prior to her employment with REBR, Karen served as Director of Governmental Relations for 17 years for KAR where she worked as the lobbyist for the association on legislative and regulatory matters.

RPR CEO Dale Ross, stated, “RPR is excited to add Karen’s extensive knowledge and background with Association training and leadership to its growing member support programs. RPR is committed to provide an increasing level of opportunity to its users in order to improve their efficiency and productivity with their clients and customers.”

Download Karen’s Photo | Download RPR logo