Last week, the Real Estate Standards Organization released the latest Data Dictionary version 1.3 for industry consumption and adoption. Like all RESO releases, this is important as it should trigger you and your vendors to make data base modifications to come into compliance with this latest database naming convention. There are a lot of changes.
Real Estate agents and brokers pay handsome fees to vendors who take disparate data sets from MLSs and map them to their application. It is one of the biggest challenges to offering services. Our industry has fallen well behind in adopting these standards and it puts us all in jeopardy of losing the position of being in the center of real estate transactions. It is incumbent upon all of us to take action to move forward in the adoption of RESO standards to remain a healthy and vibrant industry.
In this latest release, there were many modifications as well as 24 new fields added – many to support property types like commercial. This release will also be the first version that will be tested and certified for compliance. Data providers that apply and pass RESO Data Dictionary compliance tests will be awarded a certificate which allows them to display a certificate badge on their website as well as being recorded and displayed in RESO’s website (reso.org).
The last release of the Data Dictionary was v1.2 in August of 2013. In truth, many MLSs and vendors are at varying stages of adapting to that release. The best practice is to take this release date seriously and plan your adoption timeline with your vendors and customers. Communication is paramount to allow everyone to move forward accordingly. Running in parallel is also paramount so that you can keep existing systems running on old versions operational while everyone converts. Make clear what your timeline is for closing support for legacy data feed formats.
About RESO
RESO is a non-profit organization supported by member dues. It creates an environment for the development and implementation of data standards and processes that facilitate innovation, insure portability, eliminate redundancies and obtain maximum efficiencies for all parties participating in the real estate transaction. WAV Group is a founding member of the organization. We strongly encourage all MLSs, technology vendors, franchise organizations, and brokers to join the organization and support the critical role that RESO standards provide to our industry. For most organizations, the costs are trivial as they are commensurate with the size of your organization. Get more information about RESO standards releases and membership at http://www.reso.org/join
