Let's keep to the topic of the article. We have been in the discount / fee for service business since 1996. It's not easy but it is the way of the future. However, I only see it as a form of niche marketing. A way the smaller independents with low overhead can compete with the large national frnachise companies. However, in my opinion it will never work under the umbrella of a large real estate franchise that is also offering the traditional type of service. You have the same company preaching two completely different sermons. It is almost like a dual agency situation. Now CB agents will have to compete against themselves at times for the listing. There will be lots of bad, bad feelings within the ranks of CB and cendant. One group preaching the do it yourself, no service option and the other group preaching the full service option. Soon all CB agents will be forced to offer the same services to all consumers. Guess which one they will pick if the new 2% program has any success. It also smells like a "bait and switch" system to me. It wasn't that long ago that Costco were trying to get into the discount real estate business. They had signed up John L. Scott as one of their sponsoring brokers. It took JLS less than a month to jump ship. As a small independent I would love to see all the cendant companies go in this direction. Cendant is too big to sink, but not too big to face some major problems within the ranks. Prediction: CB will drop their program within 2 months.

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