The acting inspector general of the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), aka the organization’s “internal watchdog” who polices waste, fraud and abuse, has been removed from his position, as reported by Reuters. The FHFA website now designates the position as vacant. Joe Allen is the latest in a chain of several other watchdogs who have…
As mortgage rates finally tick down and the industry gets comfortable with new rules, 2026 is shaping up to be a year of opportunity. To help real estate professionals hit the ground running, RISMedia’s 6th Annual Real Estate’s Rocking in the New Year returns on Thursday, January 8, 2026, from 11:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.…
Everyone knows that buying a house is expensive, but few buyers are well-aquainted with the laundry list of expenses involved. Even if you’ve saved up for a nice down payment on your home, you’ll still have to consider all of the hidden costs to budget in before going through with the purchase.
Here’s a look at some of the costs buyers encounter when buying a house, and some tips for staying within budget.
Follow Up Boss (FUB), owned by Zillow, has updated its terms of service and privacy notice to enable deeper integration and next-generation features designed to help agents work smarter and connect more effectively with clients. The update was driven by the deeper integration between Follow Up Boss and new functionality the company will roll out…
Just three weeks after its release, “The REAL AI Guide for Real Estate Agents: No Hype. No BS. Just Real ChatGPT Skills You’ll Use Every Day” has reached No. 3 on Amazon’s best-seller list for real estate sales books. Written by Kevin Hawkins, a well known speaker and educator of AI in real estate, the…
Above, Gretchen Coley Gretchen Coley grew up poor, waiting tables and doing menial chores to pay her way through the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. She took her degree in finance to Wall Street, where she interned long enough to realize that neither trading nor the New York vibe suited her taste for gracious…
The COURT REPORT is RISMedia’s weekly look at current and upcoming lawsuits, investigations and other legal developments around real estate. Compass’s request for Zillow/Redfin documents currently denied This past week saw new developments in the ongoing litigation between Compass and Zillow, the crux of which is Compass’s objections to Zillow’s new rules that remove listings…
Ahead of the Nov. 18 hearing over its legal challenge to Zillow’s new listing rules, Compass filed a supplemental brief against the portal, accusing it of weaponizing its dominance in the home portal market to crush competition and force home sellers and agents to list properties on its platform first. In the pre-hearing brief submitted…
They’re the opposite ends of the home-buying spectrum. One phrase lights up a potential owner’s face, while the other forces a frown. The former is a no-brainer for you, the agent, while the latter can test your ability to keep a client in check. It’s plug-and-play versus quasi-fixer-upper. It is easy to accentuate the positives,…
“In a housing market that’s bouncing along the bottom, Zillow continues to outperform both our outlook and the broader industry,” claimed CEO Jeremy Wacksman during the company’s Q3 2025 earnings call on Thursday, October 30. The call took on a congratulatory tone as Zillow leadership spotlighted strong financial performance and Zillow’s consumer and agent-facing initiatives,…
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