From the Realtors. We take the pics, find out what the seller wants for the house, then we download it to the MLS on Realtor.com.

I see but why would they do that if a house is not up for sale?

Well, they wouldn’t. Can you explain the situation please?

I don’t know for sure but I imagine they are like Zillow, using a variety of public information and putting it into a formula they have, with who knows what factors included (or whether they’re entirely impartial or not).

For example, they already clean data on the sale history of the specific house and nearby houses, their statistics and what they sold for.

Certified appraisers do the same sort of calculation, comparing to nearby houses and sales and their statistics. Only in that case a trained person not just an algorithm considers it.

Realtor.com is MUCH more reliable than Zillow. If a house is taken off the market, they note that, unlike Zillow…who takes stuff without asking. My house still shows up for sale on Zillow from 2010. We took it off the market that same year.

Now that is strange.I see though.

Realtor.com is the public website of the Reator association. For a real estate agent to be able to use the MLS, they need to join the realtor association and pay fees for the MLS. When a listing is put in the MLS it immediately syncs with realtor.com.

The other websites like Zillow, pull the data from realtor.com. Zillow also allows sellers to post their own homes, which realtor doesn’t do, because the realtor association tries to protect realtors, and for sale by owner works against realtors.

The photos are photos the realtor loaded into the mls.

What estimates do you mean? The house value?

The houses on there that are “off the market” were at one time for sale. I bought my house six years ago and it is still there with the photos. They do not “Put” houses on the site if not for sale.

I understand that but it is a newer photo. It have the car on the outside in a different spot it was in before. You can tell it was recent. Before the cars were in the driveway now the same cars are parked on the street.

Probably from Google Street View.

Yeah, google street view sounds very possible.

@honeybun35 are you sure you’re looking at the MLS? Random bots can not just download pictures into it. It has to be done by a licensed Realtor.

I am not sure but when I looked up the address it showed current photo from realtor.com.

@honeybun35 that didn’t work unless you live in Mililani HI.

Mine shows Washington DC…with the option to change it.

Real Estate agents pay to put their listings in the what used to a book, but now it may be strictly online. The agents can make changes to their listing, including adding and deleting photos, for as long as the listing is active.