To attain its high reputation, Vancouver Island Real Estate Board's Directors
and committees have had to work together and co-ordinate their expertise.
Members of the public usually interact with individual members of the Board -
REALTORS - and not the VIREB itself.
This co-operative MLS® system enables all members of the Board to share
information about properties listed for sale. The Board is the nucleus, or
operating heart, of the MLS®, which provides a sound, fast and fair
merchandising structure to the buying and selling public and a sales tool that
is one of the greatest benefits a licensee could possibly have.
Basically, the MLS® is a professional network involving all VIREB's 802
REALTORS, representing approximately 68 offices in the Board area. The MLS®
maintains information on over 3,800 active listings of property for sale on the
Island. Listings range from undeveloped lots to business opportunities or
special properties. At any given time, there may be over 2,700 residential
properties listed in the MLS®.
Through the use of MLS®, the computer and services of the Real Estate Board in
concert with the expertise of the salesperson and the real estate firm, the
marketing of property extends beyond the normal geographic boundaries of the
community where the property is located. There are approximately 1,739
salespersons on Vancouver Island, including Victoria, who know and cooperate
with their colleagues in other communities. In addition, there are over 70,089
salespersons spread across Canada - of which most have computer facilities
similar to this Board, meaning direct access is available.
On the average, the Board receives approximately 64 listings per day which are updated virtually every minute of every working day. The minute a listing is entered into the database, it becomes available to all salespersons. REALTORS are able to customize a house search specifically for their potential buyers simply by connecting to the VIREB computer at any time of the day.
All listings on the MLS® are also given Internet exposure, through the www.mls.ca site. This site, which is updated each business day with new listings and changes to existing ones, enables the public to search through all MLS® listings across Canada (over 80 Board listings are included) - and makes contacting the Listing Salesperson easy and convenient - from anywhere in the world! Statistics show that VIREB's property feature sheets viewed on the Internet each month are constantly on the rise. This site acknowledged approximately 5,000 hits in April, 1996 -- and has grown to over 587,420 in November 2003.
REALTOR and Supplementary MLS® catalogues are also available - updated and
published weekly. These catalogues contain the largest and most
comprehensive inventory of homes available for sale on Vancouver Island. A
photograph and informative description of each home is included, as well as
listing information for condominium townhouses and apartments, mobile homes,
land, commercial and income properties. Everything considered pertinent to the
sale of a property is in these catalogues; ie. property features, price,
location, wheelchair access, schools. Where the REALTOR catalogue is only
available to REALTORS, the Supplementary Catalogue has been designed
specifically for REALTORS to purchase from VIREB to then distribute to the public.
Both catalogues are an important marketing vehicle for the REALTOR.
REALTORS' access to the system means that properties listed for sale receive
wide exposure thus increasing the opportunity for quicker sales and fewer
problems. Through either direct computer access or via the printed MLS®
catalogue, REALTORS have a superior marketing tool at their fingertips when
working to match sellers with buyers. The MLS® sales data also provides
valuable statistical analyses of the local housing market.
The MLS® is made possible through VIREB's highly sophisticated computer, nicknamed "ERNIE" by Board Staff. VANDAT originated from the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver, who shared their technology and expertise with VIREB and other boards across Canada. It not only manages the MLS® inventory control, but also assists with the day to day management of the Board operations.
VIREB began its conversion to computerization in August 1980, by going "live" on its new computer. This first phase entailed the processing of listings, sales, membership control and the Board's general administrative operation. The second phase in September 1980 introduced the full "on-line" inquiry system to the general membership and the third and final phase was the introduction of the complete catalogue system in January 1981.
From this conversion evolved the mainframe computer system VIREB operates today. "ERNIE" today is a Hewlett-Packard e3000 A500, sporting five 18GB SCSI hard drives and 1024MB of main memory. He works long hours - in fact, it is only on rare occasions that he is NOT working. Not only is he responding to terminals at locations other than the Board office, but also he is doing jobs internally assigned to him for completion. To date, "ERNIE" has 4 incoming telephone lines for members' use throughout the Board area. As of 2000, members also have the option of using the Internet to connect to "ERNIE". New enhancements and menus are continuously being worked on and studied to ensure the best possible service to our members. In April of 2003 a new "front-end" access software with enhanced features was made available to members for accessing MLS® data.
