There are a growing number of online real estate platforms to search for single family, multifamily and commercial investment properties for sale. Each has their pro’s & con’s and as an investor searching in a fast moving Pacific Northwest market, opportunity can present itself on several or just one of the platforms depending on property type. Constant Commercial Real Estate Inc shares our go-to sites to stay up-to-date on new, pending and old listings. We will also describe how your Broker/Agent can be a major benefit in identifying off-market opportunities by leveraging their relationships. 

Multiple Listing Service (MLS) - The multiple listing service is where real estate brokers, agents and realtors input properties they have been hired to sell. The private platform is a cooperation of real estate brokers to share information on properties they have listed and invite other brokers to cooperate in exchange for compensation. This high exposure platform showcases the listed properties and funnels them to brokers with a pool of buyer clients with a defined criteria. The MLS is a powerful tool for brokers and allows the smaller firms to compete with larger national firms on an equal playing field. The MLS is generally a private database that is created, maintained and paid for by real estate professionals and is region specific. Some MLS platforms have a broker/agent portal allowing agents and their clients to save, favorite and comment on listings in a cooperative manner.  The downside to the MLS (to an investor) is it is exclusive to only real estate brokers who choose to subscribe. Many commercial and apartment listings never make their way to the MLS. Talk with your broker about leveraging this tool that ultimately funnels to the common public listing sites. 

The Multiple Listing Service funnels into several public user-friendly online listing sites. Some of the common ones are zillow, redfin, trulia and realtor.com. These listing platforms have several similarities and boils down to preference. Our favorite public sites are discussed and starting with residential then ending in commercial dominant platforms.

Commercial - 

1. CoStar is the largest commercial real estate information and analytics provider in the nation. They own several other platforms such as homes.com, loopnet, apartments.com,ten-x, homesnap, and land.com. They are a powerhouse of data and provide tools to real estate professionals and investors. They cover all commercial property types and require a subscription. Many listings in Co-Star are only available to subscribers, but an agent who subscribes can share them with their clients. The program is used by professionals to do rent studies, comparable sales analysis, prospecting, lease information and accessing public information on one platform. 
2. LoopNet is owned by CoStar and predominantly commercial, apartment and land listings. Loopnet is geared towards income producing real estate. We set up searches to get notification of property types across the state that align with our current clients needs. 
3. Crexi is a newer platform described as a real estate community, marketplace and technology company. Listing for brokers is free as they grow their platform. They continue to increase their data for prospecting and tools for investors and real estate professionals searching for listings. We set up searches similar to CoStar and Loopnet as it is common because of the low cost for listings to end up here and not on the other larger platforms. 

Residential - 

1. Redfin is a large Seattle based residential real estate brokerage found in 95 major markets in the United States and Canada. Redfin’s application for most is to just explore currently listed properties. We find the platform to be very user friendly. As with all residential listing sites, they are covered in paid advertisements by brokers and offering their services. 
2. Zillow is similar to Redfin as it is a large national brokerage that does offer brokerage services. This is another user-friendly website to view listings and rentals. We find clients who cruise these websites for residential, land and 2-4 unit listings are using them for its easy to use platform and apps. 
3. Realtor.com is also similar to Zillow and Redfin, but is built around being a resource for Brokers to receive recommendations and ratings for their recently closed listings. Not everything maps to the program, but it is a way to see brokers closed sales in your area. Professional accounts link to the MLS to parse the data over. 
4. Trulia is another public site that is owned by Zillow. 
5. There are endless small marketplaces like RealNex, BiggerPockets, Facebook and Craigslist  designed for a low entry, inexpensive and often free place to market specialty properties to investors.

*When it comes to use of the above residentially focused programs, it really comes down to preference. Be careful not to inquire with brokers running advertisements if you already have an agency relationship with a broker/agent/realtor. These programs will parse the commercial and apartments that are listed into the MLS, but not all opportunities will be input. If you’re interested in learning the market and viewing listings, consult with one of our brokers and we can all get searches set up in a variety of programs to get prompt notification of properties that fit your criteria. 

Off-market listings can be identified. Our brokers have gained experience in their respective markets and property type focus areas. We have nurtured relationships with other brokers, clients and investors through past transactions and networking. It is not uncommon for the community to share coming soon or pocket (off-market, may not be listed) listings of a variety of property types. As our clients' needs change throughout the year and with each transaction, we network with our sphere of brokers to identify these opportunities early. This goes both ways as we share coming soon and off-market opportunities with our clients and others who we have created a relationship with. During Constant Commercial’s prospecting, we often hear of investors who would sell but do not want to go through the listing process - so we have commonly stuck deals together by making a note and revisiting the opportunity when one fits a clients investment profile. 

We are a regional investment real estate and commercial mortgage brokerage firm serving private investor clients throughout the state of Oregon. We work with investors searching for strategic capital and real estate portfolio advising. CCRE takes a consultative and analytical approach to income-producing real estate acquisitions, dispositions, financing and portfolio capital/equity management.