Both Yahoo! and AOL are publishing magazine content from SmartMoney. Prominent in this month's issue is a story called "Ten Things Your Real Estate Broker Won't Tell You," by Michael Kaplan.

"Next to car salesman, they're probably the least-trusted middle-men out there. And for good reason. Here's why." says the lead-in. The story then goes on to catalog ten unethical business practices most of which would get any real estate licensee fined, sued, fired and/or delicensed. In short, these activities, like failing to disclose agency, failing to disclose offers on the home to the seller, and withholding known disclosures about a property's structural elements, are presented as if they are everyday business practices.

The article appears in different forms on the personal finance/mortgage pages of AOL and Yahoo!. Judging by the negative slant and without clearly opposing points of view, the magazine evidences a lot of contempt for brokers.

Criticisms of the real estate community similar to the SmartMoney story have been around for awhile, according to Google.com. Variations of this theme have been published by Forbes and Wells Fargo, as well as by Yahoo!.

But where is the balance? Where does it say more than five million existing homes were sold last year, most with the assistance of realty professionals? Are all brokers evil, or does real estate have a few bad apples -- like all professions? How many real estate licensees were censured by regulatory bodies or courts last year?

Is this what AOL and Yahoo! want to feature?

AOL enters into content agreements with partners so that it can provide compelling news and information to its 24 million subscribers without having to become experts in a wide variety of vertical industries. To keep ISP subscribers loyal, AOL has to provide value, a reason to come to - not to skip over - the pages that it provides its readers (and the advertising revenues it provides its investors). By choosing proven leaders as their content providers, AOL brings star power and expertise to its vertical channels such as homes (Homestore) and personal finance (SmartMoney Magazine.) In addition, AOL is able to pocket handsome advertising fees for sharing its hefty subscriber base with other companies.

According to the 2001 REALTOR Mag Mediamark Research 48.2% of REALTORS use AOL as their ISP.

The article is only a click or two away from homes for sale, listing content Yahoo! and AOL get from real estate brokers. Yet there's something wrong with a system that takes money from Realtors with one hand and slaps them in the face with the other.

It could be that the two channels of a large portal simply don't talk to each other. But mortgages and homes for sale are simply too close for comfort. If I were in charge of the mortgage channel, would I want to shoot my counterpart in homes-for-sale in the foot? Just to get content? I don't think so.

What if Realtors decided to do something about it? Many brokers have written the SmartMoney editors, but the magazine is already on the newsstands. Too late to change anything there.

Could Realtors protest directly to AOL and Yahoo!?

That was an effective strategy when Forbes and Wells Fargo published similar stories last year.

While Forbes.com defended its story and its advertising opportunities for agents and their listings to Agent News, it got a good talking-to from angry brokers. Wells Fargo went much further. It removed the offending story, and put a positive story in its place. Approximately 70 percent of Wells Fargo's mortgage loan referrals come from real estate agents, you see. At the time, a spokesperson told Agent News that the online content team didn't know how important Realtors were to the mortgage side of the business.

Homestore might have a say with AOL. While it doesn't have editorial control over AOL, it does power AOL's homes for sale channel, and provides listings via Realtor.com. Homestore contracts with MLSs and brokers to aggregate their listings. Homestore would not care to risk brokers asking that their listings not be shown on Realtor.com because of a content deal with AOL.

"Realtors provide a valuable service to consumers, and we're disappointed that this was not fairly and accurately represented in the story," says Dan Wool, Homestore spokesperson. "We've raised our concern about this with AOL."

With Yahoo!, could brokers refuse the site's new pay-to-play business model? Brokers' listings are free on Yahoo! Real Estate if the broker's MLS provides the listings to the portal. But Yahoo! doesn't pay for listings, so an MLS can cancel sending them anytime. Brokers pay up to $49 to advertise each listing if they want to get leads personally. Yahoo! Real Estate might be happy to listen when a broker explains that it doesn't make sense to advertise on a site that is driving leads away with scary bad broker stories.

It's worked before. When Homestore posted Realtor.com listings on Bank of America's HomeSolutions site without the NAR's permission last year, angry brokers protested and Realtor.com listings were gone the following day, never to return.

AOL and Yahoo! others can think what they like of brokers in private, but if they want brokers' money or their listings, they should pay more attention to what their content partners are doing.

From a spokesperson at Yahoo!:

As an aggregator Yahoo! collects and provides a variety of real estate links, tools and content provided by third party sources, in order to help consumers in the home buying or selling process. Yahoo! remains impartial to third party content, and the article you referenced is provided by SmartMoney.com.

Yahoo! also has third party content that provides a different point of view than the article you referenced. For example, Working With A Real Estate Agent, How Do You Find A Good Agent

Yahoo! Real Estate is a valuable platform for real estate brokers, because it provides localized and personalized marketing tools and access to one of the largest consumer audiences on the Internet.

Neither SmartMoney or AOL responded to requests for interviews in time for publication.

Published: January 22, 2002

Use of this article without permission is a violation of federal copyright laws.

Blanche is a renowned author of five real estate books. Her newest, Bubbles, Booms and Busts: Make Money In Any Real Estate Market, McGraw-Hill, was rave-reviewed by The New York Times. She was also selected from hundreds of real estate experts to contribute to Donald Trump's book, Trump: The Best Real Estate Advice I Ever Received: 100 Top Experts Share Their Strategies, Rutledge Hill Press, and is featured on page 68. Order Now Review - Honors In 2006, Blanche was selected among scores of candidates to author two consumer real estate guidebooks for the National Association of Realtors: The NAR Guide to Home Buying, and The NAR Guide to Home Selling, Wiley & Sons. She is currently planning two new books for the NAR and its members.       Known for her keen insight into real estate industry issues and for her ability to make complex subjects easy to understand, Blanche is a sought-after keynote and continuing education speaker. Real estate organizations from MLSs, to brokerages, to franchisors, to associations hire her to provide up-to-the-minute analysis of real estate industry news and advice on how to improve revenues. Her passionate delivery, peppered with stinging wit, is a huge hit with audiences and fans. Don Klein, CEO Greater Nashville Association of Realtors, Blanche Evans, Richard Courtney, president 2007, GRAR "The GNAR membership meeting last week featured Blanche Evans as the keynote speaker. Her comments and insights resonated extremely well with those in attendance and we have had many requests for copies of her PowerPoint Presentation. She was a terrific part of the membership meeting and convention program!" - Don Klein, CEO Greater Nashville Association of Realtors Coverage from WSMV, Nashville - 8-14-2007 That Interview Guy - Get Inside The Head Of Today's Generation 2007 AE Institute Session - To purchase 2006 AE Institute Session - Parts 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 HouseValues Mastermind call - Parts 1 2 Blanche's fireside chat with Jeremy Conaway, HAR - Click here. For more articles by Blanche, click here.