An idea came to Catherine Deeths during the weekly real estate breakfasts where agents announce properties coming to market or the wishes of their buyers.
For agents, such insider information can mean sales. Even so, Deeths, an agent with North Bay Property Advisors in Santa Rosa, said, “I was sitting in those meetings and wondering why we don’t do it a better way.”
The answer that she created is Agent2AgentLink, a website that allows agents to share with one another about homes coming to market. The site also sends automatic e-mails to agents whose buyers and sellers might be possible matches based upon details posted online.
In the Internet age, the general public can visit many sites showing homes listed for sale, said Dave Roberts, an agent with Healdsburg Sotheby’s International Realty. What makes Agent2AgentLink different is that only agents can use it, and the site gives them an edge with information “that the public doesn’t have yet,” he said.
If an agent learns of a great home coming to market, Roberts said, “you have a better chance of getting your buyer in a position to purchase it.”
Deeths launched the site two years ago. About 200 agents now use it. Most of them signed up this year.
For the service, agents pay about $10 a month, or $108 a year.
Other places exist to learn about properties coming to market, including the online site Top Agent Network. Also, local agents can receive regular e-mails recapping what was shared at the weekly meetings sponsored around Sonoma County by the North Bay Association of Realtors.
But Deeths noted that Top Agent Network’s membership is limited to the top 15 percent of agents in a market. And she maintained that she receives postings that won’t get announced at the weekly real estate meetings.
Laura Hall, an agent with Century 21 Alliance in Santa Rosa, said she has sold properties through Deeth’s site.
She has used it as a barometer to get feedback from other agents on a proposed price range for properties that she will bring to market. The site also helps her advertise the wishes of her buyers.
And the postings on upcoming properties give her an “insider’s scoop” over even tech-savvy buyers and sellers.
“It makes me look good as an agent,” she said.
— Robert Digitale