Tip of the Week – Big Text, Small Text!

Big text, small text. Dr. Seuss would continue this with “red text, blue text.” But in this case, I’m talking about text fields in the MLS, and how they’ve changed. This is something you need to be aware of both entering new listings into flexmls and checking your listings that came over from List-It.

Did you know that our contract with flexmls includes a guarantee against down time? That means that if the system is down for more than so much time per month, it costs them money. So they do everything they can to avoid situations where the system can be down.

One of the ways FBS does this is to have a very stable foundation for the system. Every MLS that uses this system has the same base program. There are this many lists, this many text fields, etc. Lists can have as many options as needed. Text fields must come in specific sizes. There are large ones and small ones. The smallest will be ones like Baths or Bedrooms, with two or three characters. The largest is 10,000 characters, which was a public field only. After that, there are 1000, 800, 400, 200, (one each) and a bunch that are smaller. Every MLS is customized within the limits of these fields. Strictly.

So when we come in with four 4000 character fields, we knew there would be some issues. Compromises had to be made. I did some checking of the listings in List-It and confirmed that for the most part, the largest use of the text fields was Remarks. I knew it would be a bad idea to allow 10000 characters for Remarks. If you have trouble printing listings to one page in List-It, imagine what it would be like if Remarks allowed up to 10,000 characters!

So we compromised. We gave Remarks the 800 character field with the 10,000 character supplement, and Agent Notes* (the second largest text field usage in List-It) the 1000 character field. The others, like Directions and Legal Description got the smaller text fields.

Any listing that transferred from List-It to flexmls with more than 800 characters in Remarks would have the remaining text go into the Supplement field. This does print as an additional page.

If the listing had more than the allotted character limit in the other text fields: Agent Notes*, Directions, Legal Description, that text was lost.

So how do you go from using 4000 characters to 1000 characters or less? First, be precise.

Second, there is a caption field with photos that allows up to 1000 characters. You know that detailed description of the kitchen features, or the master bathroom? Put that in the photo caption. Save the space in Remarks for things that cannot be described anywhere else.

The Photo Description field is the name of the photo, Living Room, Kitchen, etc, and will appear above the photo when you print the listing. The Photo Caption field is the field to use to detail the room. This will display below the photo when the listing is printed.

When you’re viewing the photos in the MLS, the Description will appear in the drop-down list above the photos, and allows you to move from photo to photo. The Caption will appear right below the drop-down list.

* If your listing requires specific disclosure added due to seller request (often REO’s or short sales), my recommendation is to add that as a separate document instead of using all of the available space in the Agent Notes field. Be sure to leave the document private (not public) so that only agents will be able to access the document.

Check your listings in flexmls. Make sure that these larger text fields didn’t cut off mid-sentence. Use the Caption field for the photos to describe the rooms. Or use additional documents for things that are necessary but too lengthy to put in the available text fields.

Don’t forget the often forgotten Association Management Company and Contact. Both of these fields are limited to 20 characters. All that’s needed for these fields is the name of the professional management company for the HOA, and the contact phone number. In many listings out of List-It, the phone number was cut off due to the inclusion of the manager’s name.

Next Tip will cover flexmls Hot Sheets.

Questions? Call us at 850-244-2411, or email susan@ecaor.com.

Susan Beck, I.S. Director
Emerald Coast Association of Realtors
Fort Walton Beach, FL