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elfnerdherder · 7 years

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Dread and Hunger: Ch. 17

You can read Chapter 17 on Ao3 Here

Chapter 17: Sacramental

Abigail visited him, and it was the only time in his entire hospital stay that he cried.

Jack was released from the hospital, but he still visited Will. Will liked to imagine that it was because they’d both almost died in Tobias Budge’s shop, but he wasn’t stupid. Jack wanted as much information from Will as he could get, to better hunt down what the news had coined ‘Hannibal the Cannibal’.

“Once you’re stable enough to be moved, we’re going to take you to a secure location until we can establish a safe house,” he’d told him, mulling over a few files. He wore high-necked undershirts that hid the worst of his wound.

“Don’t you think he’s going to be angry about that?” Will asked, staring out of the window. It echoed previous conversations. “He will start a bloodbath because I’m not anywhere accessible.”

“You’re accessible now, and he hasn’t come out,” Jack pointed out. He paused, looking up from his files. “…He hasn’t, has he, Will?” he clarified.

“Not that I know of,” said Will, and he couldn’t tell if it was bitterness or hurt in the tone of his voice. Jack surveyed him skeptically before going back to his work.

“Depending on how he acts after, we may have to look into witness protection for you.”

“I’ve always wanted to be undercover.”

“Your sarcasm is noted. Your safety is my priority, though.” He sighed, mulling over something on a report. “I should have pulled you sooner. You shouldn’t have been left like that.”

“He was careful,” Will said, like that explained everything. “The things I saw were things I’d have seen in anyone else, and where I knew him, I dismissed it. Same for you, too.”

“He’s helped on FBI cases before,” Jack groused.

“That’s because he’s dramatic and enjoys being the center of attention,” Will said without thinking. When Jack met his gaze, he quickly amended, “What better way to keep you out of his business than to be completely invested in yours?”

“That would explain why he engaged you as both Hannibal and the Chesapeake Ripper,” Jack said with a curt not. “One aspect of your attention wasn’t enough.”

“Which is why I don’t think making me disappear is the best idea. You’ll get his attention, but you won’t like how he does it.” Among other things.

There is no place you could go that I would not follow.

“If we can use his anger, then we will. We’re going to get that bastard,” Jack said ardently. Will looked away from the window and to the FBI agent that shouldn’t truly be working after what he’d just gone through.

“Obsession is a dangerous thing,” he said to Jack.

“You think I’m obsessed?” he asked, dangerously quiet. “You’re damn right, Will. You’re hospitalized from almost dying at the hands of a psychopath, and the Chesapeake Ripper got away after getting so close you were inviting him over to dinner. I’m obsessed with justice. I’m obsessed with getting that bastard for everything he’s done. I’m not going to rest until he’s either dead or behind bars.”

Will nodded and looked away from him. If Jack had lied, he’d have known it. He could taste it, something that radiated from Jack’s skin with a passion, with a frenzy.

“You’re going to use me going to a safe house as bait to lure him out,” Will said. He thought of Doritos crunched in hand as he goaded Jack on campus. He thought of Jack’s wife, of his dying and her dying and how everything felt like the aged petals of a flower –limp, despondent and veined with brown and death.

“Not until you’re well enough to be moved,” Jack promised.

“How’s your wife’s cancer?”

“Still cancerous.”

He stared at the one, singular vase that’d stood out to him from all of the rest. Friends, co-workers past and present, and random well-wishers kept them in wild, loud supply, more coming every day from those who read the papers or watched the news. There was one, though, one that he stared at whenever he could bring himself to, and he sighed.

Freesia, amaranth, roses, verbena, forget-me-not, iris, carnations, dianthus.

“I’m sure you’ll get him in the end, Jack,” Will said dispassionately.

The news said he’d killed Tobias Budge and almost died in the process. He’d been found slumped to the side of the Baltimore Symphony Killer’s still body, barely hanging onto life, the wires he’d used to strangle him cast aside. Will wasn’t going to refute that. Hannibal’s plastic suit would have ensured he left no trace, and it made things so much easier for people to think he was some sort of hero rather than the Chesapeake Ripper’s fuck buddy.

Freddie Lounds said, much to the delight of her fans, that Will’s wounds looked like a Glasgow smile made by a lover. The photo of the colostomy bag had the top hits on the search engine for the first two weeks. It would have been removed from Facebook articles, but his junk had been covered with a large, black rectangle, so there was nothing truly grotesque to report on any social media sights. Alana promised him she’d tried her best.

He lay on his bed, staring at the vase of flowers left for him. He wondered what the petals would taste like, now that his tongue knew the flavor of blood.

The nurses liked to gossip just outside of his door when they thought he was asleep. Mostly it was about the other nurses not doing their jobs, or doctors that took all the credit. Janice that ran the desk in the ICU had a lot of struggles with her plantar fasciitis, and Derek never called Brandon back. Brandon figured that he was being stood up, and Yvonne offered to set him up with her cousin visiting from California. Dr. Stinton griped that the nurse running the front desk of the hospital wasn’t forwarding his wife’s calls to his office, and she was one step away from getting fired. Maurice told Hannah that Dr. Stinton wouldn’t fire her –he was fucking her, which is why she wasn’t forwarding his wife’s calls.

They also liked to talk about Will, though. Whenever they thought the medicine held him deep in the clutches of drug-induced sleep, they loved to talk about his injuries, how he’d gotten them, the horrible things he’d endured. Unless he was being given codeine with his medicine, he didn’t sleep, instead lying in a lovely daze where everything was soft. Even their words, horrible as they sometimes were, were soft.

“What a cute thing, just the most polite young man, and when he was thirsty he tried to get out of bed because he didn’t want to trouble me for water.”

“He tried to get out of bed? With that injury?”

“Oh, yes, I got to him before he ripped open his stitches. He just looked at me really confused and said he didn’t want to trouble me. Just a dove, soft-spoken and kind.”

“I read about some of the things the Ripper sent him –just evil. Just evil, and those poor people. That Agent down the way was talking with some of his men coming to visit, talking about the letter about wanting to hear him screaming? I got shivers.”

“He’s going to need therapy, I think.”

“Hun, I’m the one taking care of him and I need therapy.” A pause as they mulled over things. “He woke up screaming the other night. Sounded like he was getting stabbed all over again.”

“How much did it take to calm him?”

“I came in and by then he’d stopped…had a fist in his mouth like he could just hold it all in. We changed the dosage of his medicine, and it helped.”

Sometimes, they wondered at his friends that visited quite frequently. They gossiped about Margot and Alana kissing just outside of their car, hips pressed to hungry hips before they detached to go inside and see him. They thought Zeller was cute, in a scruffy, nerdy sort of way. They supposed Beverly and Will would date when the pain faded. Abigail was the sort of girl they wanted to go out shopping for, someone to get manis and pedis with. It seemed they knew her history as much as they knew Will’s. The Minnesota Shrike’s daughter, there to comfort the Chesapeake Ripper’s pet.

“You know, I think Abigail and Will would date when he’s not scared anytime he closes his eyes he’s going to wake up with the Ripper over him,” Hannah said.

“Oooh don’t say that, what if he shows up here? Is he going to eat us?”

“Hannibal the Cannibal, indeed!”

“I heard he’s a rich socialite in Baltimore –not socializing so much anymore, I’d say. My friend’s cousin’s schoolmate saw him for therapy, but I guess they need a new doctor, now.”

“I’d want a new doctor after that.”

“At least the poor dear didn’t get eaten.” They both laughed, short, nervous sounds. It was funny to them until it wasn’t, until they paused just long enough to really think about it.

Sometimes they wondered at his family, how no one signing in to visit had his last name. When his doctor went over medical records, he informed him of not knowing too much, since they were all dead or gone. They thought long and hard about a mother that’d left and a father that’d passed from cancer, and they bemoaned children that grew up without siblings. Maurice had siblings, and she couldn’t imagine a life without four other kids in the house shouting all of the time.

Sometimes they wondered if he was attracted to any of them. He tried his best not to listen to those conversations, but they were there all the same. Sometimes they wondered if Hannibal the Cannibal ever forced himself on Will, and it was at those times that he placed the pillow over his head or made a big show of turning on the TV and turning the volume up loudly. That always caused them to scatter in every which direction uneasily.

Mostly, they wondered about how he was going to move on from all of this, when the FBI was gone, the ‘fame’ was gone, and the wound still remained. Those times, Will was left staring at the ceiling and wondering something very much the same.

When he dreamt, he felt Hannibal’s hands in his, the taste of blood on his tongue as he traced over the ridges of his ribs, wanting to savor each inch of bare skin. It took several dreams before he realized the hazy memories of the night he’d given into the Chesapeake Ripper had blended into the memories when Hannibal had made him forget his troubles for a little while.

He would wake and stare at the vase of flowers for a long time. Every time the old ones were thrown away, a new vase took its place within a day.

When he could, he would shuffle about the hospital room, taking his time to catch his breath whenever it tried to leave him. It was one such time, while he leaned against the window, that something cream colored caught his eye, tucked behind the pillow on the couch. Not many people sat on the couch, preferring the chairs close to his bed. He glanced about, but no one else lurked in the room. He was completely and utterly alone.

When he felt up to a few more steps, he slumped onto the couch and fumbled behind the pillow, his breath catching as he felt a very familiar texture of paper. His thumb broke the seal of the wax, and he poured six seeds to his palm. With them, the long dead petals of violet hyacinth and white tulips fluttered out, browned at the edges. They’d been plucked some time ago –three weeks? Will crumbled the tulip petals in his hand as he unfolded the letter, gaze hungry.

Dearest Will,

I sometimes hold it half a sin To put in words the grief I feel; For words, like Nature, half reveal And half conceal the Soul within. But, for the unquiet heart and brain, A use in measured language lies; The sad mechanic exercise, Like dull narcotics, numbing pain. In words, like weeds, I'll wrap me o'er, Like coarsest clothes against the cold: But that large grief which these enfold Is given in outline and no more.

Always yours,

-Hannibal

He pressed the paper to his lips, and it was only the sound of approaching footsteps much, much later that made him tuck the letter away, one of many secrets in the room filled with the flowers of the admiring.

He dreamt of an ocean, the waves cresting over him but not dragging him under, warm hands at his hips, his skin welcoming the graze of gentle lips.

He woke to someone in his hospital room.

It was not a nurse because nurse’s shoes always made the same agonizing noise on the tile floor. It was not the doctors’ stability or motion control shoes, nor was it Beverly’s booted heels. The steps were silent, a mere whisper, and Will blinked up at the ceiling, waiting.

All of the lights were off, from the overhead to the lamp to the small light by the sink. Even the small night light that they kept plugged into an outlet had been removed, rendering the room into a shapeless darkness. He thought to be afraid. His heartrate monitor didn’t change pace though, and it was somewhat satisfying to feel the thumping of his chest remain steady, sure. He knew what this was. There was only one person in the world that would ensure that his visual sense was of no use to him when they finally managed to show up.

He thought of laughing, but at this point, even his hysteria has faded, long since removed and replaced with something a little more dismal. His stomach ached, and he wondered how close he was to getting his night time dosage of pain killers.

The petal of a flower was placed onto his mouth. Will curled his bottom lip in and rolled it onto his tongue, savoring it.

“Good evening, Will,” Hannibal said tenderly.

Will smiled.

#Dread and Hunger #LiaS scribbles #hannibal #hannigram #will graham x hannibal #someone help will graham #from the nurses #tbh they gossiped so much when I was in the hospital #my room seemed to be a specific focal point

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clavehell6-blog · 5 years

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Can NAR embrace technology without rendering agents obsolete?

(Illustration by Chris Koehler)

It was summer 2017 when Bob Goldberg ascended the stage at the Sheraton Grand Chicago. With Bruce Springsteen’s “Born to Run” playing in the background, Goldberg was introduced as the new “boss” of real estate’s most powerful trade association.

The lifelong Springsteen fan — he’s seen the Boss in concert nearly 200 times — clutched a red electric guitar and seemed to signal the beginning of a new era at the 110-year-old National Association of Realtors as he pledged to “knock down the ivory tower façade of NAR.”

But doing so hasn’t been easy for the 23-year NAR veteran, who headed marketing and business development before succeeding longtime CEO Dale Stinton.

With 1.3 million members spread across 1,300 local associations, NAR is a lobbying powerhouse. But it’s facing something of an existential challenge: how to embrace the technology that is rapidly changing the brokerage business without rendering agents obsolete.

Its efforts to do so — through a wholly owned venture fund as well as a multimillion-dollar listings portal — have generated sharp criticism from its own members.

Rob Hahn, founder of real estate consulting firm 7DS Associates, said most of NAR’s members join not because they value its services, but because it gives them access to local multiple listing services.

“The vast majority of people that are ostensibly members are just buying MLS access,” he said. “That creates a lot of animosity among brokers.”

And for all the talk of shattering ivory towers, NAR recently secured city approval to sink $45 million into its Chicago headquarters at 430 North Michigan Avenue — where plans call for adding 18,000 square feet of office space and a 25-seat glass-encased boardroom. The group plans to finance most of the project through its existing budget, but will also use $6 million from a dues increase this past May.

Amid questions over what members are getting for their money, the association is still paying the price for one of its biggest blunders.

That misstep dates back to the 1990s, when NAR licensed the listings portal Realtor.com — which it controlled — to California-based Move Inc. for $9 million a year. In theory, Realtor.com could have gone head to head with Zillow if it had focused on consumers, insiders said. Instead, critics said, NAR handcuffed Realtor’s growth by limiting the kinds of searches and data available. Today, Zillow has more than 175 million average monthly users, compared to Realtor’s 63 million.

“The story is that NAR stifled Move, and that’s why Zillow won,” said the CEO of a data startup, who spoke only on the condition of anonymity for fear of alienating NAR members. “With 1 million-plus Realtors and a great platform, Realtor.com should have beat Zillow.”

While there are those who believe the fight for digital listings is over, Goldberg isn’t one of them. In 2014, News Corporation famously bought Move for $950 million, and it has since boldly gone after Zillow’s market share. And NAR’s licensing agreement remains in place.

At his guitar-strumming introduction last year, Goldberg promised technology that could change the industry for the better.

“If we resist change, it is futile,” he said at the time. “The status quo is not an option.”

NAR’s tech play

NAR was a different kind of disrupter when it was founded in 1908 in Chicago by 120 “real estate men of America.” The group formed to exert their “combined influence” on the industry — which in 1916 included trademarking the name Realtor.

Since 2004, the organization — which also occupies a wedge-shaped, glass building a stone’s throw from the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. — has spent $440 million lobbying on issues like tax reform, flood insurance and reforming Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to protect 30-year fixed rate mortgages.

This year has been no different on the lobbying front. During 2018’s first half, NAR spent $27.3 million on federal lobbying, second only to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which shelled out $43.7 million.

“Not to be glib, but there are homeowners in every congressional district and the Realtors frequently work to inform and mobilize them, which gives the Realtors a powerful base across the country,” said Michael Beckel, policy analyst at the Washington, D.C.-based Issue One, a nonprofit that aims to reduce the influence of money in politics. “It’s safe to say NAR is one of the big dogs.”

But starting in 2008, NAR also began investing heavily in tech startups through its wholly owned subsidiary Second Century Ventures.

Such funds are extremely rare for trade organizations, according to analysts, largely because the investments could easily lead to conflicts of interest. This past May, for instance, the American Heart Association’s announcement of a $30 million VC fund sparked criticism from prominent cardiologists for that very reason.

Second Century Ventures’ initial $20 million war chest came from the membership association in the form of a line of credit. Since then, SCV has taken its returns and reinvested the money in other startups, said David Garland, a general partner at SCV since 2016. “This was never dues” money, he said.

With a median investment of $3.3 million, SCV has made 38 investments to date, showing a preference for seed- and early-stage companies, according to a dossier from research firm PitchBook. “Anything we believe can keep the Realtor at the center of the transaction and also yield a very sizable return,” Garland said.

But Second Century has kept a relatively low profile among other real estate-focused funds like MetaProp, Fifth Wall, Camber Creek and Moderne Ventures.

Competitors say that’s because it’s exclusively focused on residential real estate and tends to favor investments that can generate solid returns with less flash.

“Because they are not invested in any of the products that could be a threat to the residential community — listing aggregation platforms or anything that’s a disintermediator — they also haven’t had many big wins,” said Clelia Peters, a co-founder of MetaProp and president of Warburg Realty in New York.

In addition, sources said, at times the fund has moved slowly or been stymied by bureaucratic holdups.

“There were investments I couldn’t make along the way,” said Constance Freedman, who was SCV’s general partner until she left to found Moderne Ventures in 2015. “At the end of the day, they are a trade association, so I understand the criticism.”

Startups that have sought out SCV as an investor, however, count the affiliation with NAR as an asset.

Andrew Flachner, CEO of the data platform RealScout, said for him it was simply about the numbers: “NAR has access to 1.3 million Realtors.”

At NAR’s annual conference in Boston early last month, its executives hinted that SCV could launch another fund. But this one could use money raised directly from members. Addressing several thousand in the audience, NAR Treasurer Tom Riley said SCV — like NAR itself — was getting a major “revamp.”

“Every single subsidiary, every single rock, every single structure of the organization for the past year and a half, we dug deep,” he said. SCV’s revamp is “going to be amazing,” he promised.

Questionable investments

But the blurry line between NAR and its portfolio companies has attracted criticism.

For example, along with the California Association of Realtors, NAR jointly owns a company called zipLogix — which provides digital transaction services. CAR separately has proprietary transaction forms that it gives its members as a benefit, which it allows zipLogix to license. Some have taken issue with that practice. Zillow, for example, sued, calling it anti-competitive.

Meanwhile, Second Century’s investment in DocuSign, another tech firm, erupted into public criticism this year after NAR proposed a dues hike for 2019. (Despite resistance from members, the board approved the increase.)

“It appears that prior NAR leadership invested $20 million of member money into Second Century Ventures, which stands to generate an estimated windfall of $100 million with the pending DocuSign IPO,” said Kenya Burrell-VanWormer, head of the Houston Association of Realtors, in an April statement. “But it appears that windfall may not benefit the members. Does this make any sense to anyone?”

In a scathing op-ed published by Inman, Jim Harrison, president and CEO of MLS Listings in the San Francisco Bay Area, accused NAR’s top ranks of pocketing the DocuSign earnings.

“Efforts by industry leaders, media and real estate entities to unearth information on how these funds will be accounted for or used, have been met without transparency or accountability,” he wrote in May. “They have been shrouded in secrecy.”

NAR’s board fired back, calling Harrison’s characterization replete with “falsehoods, misrepresentations and misinformation.”

At NAR’s midyear conference in Washington, D.C., Goldberg detailed where that money went. He said Second Century invested $5 million in DocuSign in 2009 and made $43.8 million after selling 28 percent of its shares post-IPO. Of that money, it returned $20 million to NAR. Goldberg did not say what happened to the remaining $23.8 million, but the trade group has said in the past that it reinvests its profits. Goldberg and Stinton declined requests for comment for this story, as did other NAR representatives.

Despite dissent within NAR’s ranks, some 20,000 members attended the association’s Boston conference — where leader said a planned dues hike in 2020 was off the table. The hike, they said, was unnecessary because of savings from budget cuts, a staff reorganization and a surge in membership.

“If you add it all up, it’s a substantial savings, which totally turned the tide on our financial operations,” said NAR’s Riley.

Outgoing NAR President Elizabeth Mendenhall — who received a standing ovation at the event when she officially handed off the job to successor John Smaby — said the organization remains as vital as ever.

“With the changes in the industry, a lot of members are questioning where they go with their own businesses,” she said. “That’s the role that NAR continues to play — to ensure Realtors are essential to the transaction. Knowing that NAR is behind you is very powerful.”

To symbolize the leadership transition, she handed Smaby a crystal gavel, cautioning that it cannot be used to silence the crowd: “If you hit too hard, it’s going to chip.”

‘The horse has left the barn’

One of NAR’s most ambitious projects in recent memory — not to mention one of its most controversial — has been the creation of UpstreamRE, a single point of entry for residential listings nationwide. Plastered across its homepage are the words: “Streamline and take control of your data and your future.”

But today, a sense of powerlessness remains.

Introduced in 2015, the portal was billed as a way to make data more efficient and accurate by having each MLS enter listings directly. It also gives brokers and MLSs greater control over listings at a time when many see digital platforms like Zillow as a serious threat.

“There’s a common analogy that the horse has left the barn,” said Alex Lange, president and CEO of Upstream, describing the feeling among brokers that they’re no longer in control of their listings. “I say, what responsible ranch hand lets the horse go?”

Early on, NAR earmarked $6 million for Upstream. It was expected to go “full throttle” by 2016. But a year later it was still puttering along and got another $9 million boost from NAR.

Not surprisingly, members voiced frustration as they watched their dues being spent with little to show for it, several said.

“This is members’ money,” Cindy Hamann, then-chair of the Houston Association of Realtors, told Inman in 2017.

John Mosey, president of NorthstarMLS in Minnesota and Wisconsin, said NAR made statements about Upstream “to the effect that they’re on track and achieved great progress.” But Mosey — whose MLS was selected as a pilot market for Upstream three years ago — said the opposite was true.

“To my knowledge, no one in our market is using it,” he said.

NAR isn’t alone in its attempt to catch up to its digital rivals.

For years, major New York City brokers resisted calls for a local MLS — inadvertently paving the way for StreetEasy to gain massive market share. It was only last year, when the Zillow-owned portal rolled out a series of fees, that the industry scrambled to syndicate listings through the Real Estate Board of New York.

But Upstream has also drawn scrutiny for how its rollout has been handled. The job of building it fell to Realtors Property Resource, a property database and NAR subsidiary.

Upstream’s Lange, who took over in 2016, acknowledged that while the work is complex, Realtors Property had taken “entirely too long to build this.” But, he said, because Realtors Property was “building it for me for free, I kind of have to go with it.”

Under Goldberg’s leadership, NAR has responded to the Upstream delay. In February, it directed Realtors Property to pull the plug on a project that would provide back-end technology for small and midsized MLSs. And in August, NAR slashed 10 percent of Realtors Property staff.

But it’s still not clear that Upstream has member buy-in — or that it ever did.

In a survey last year by the Council of Multiple Listing Services, more than half of MLSs said they weren’t sure if they would participate in Upstream, and 13 percent had “no interest” in participating.

Last year, former NAR Chief Executive Stinton blamed the MLSs. He said they hadn’t fully participated because they were unhappy that Upstream would control the listings.

“It’s pretty disappointing,” Stinton said. “Politics, and that’s my polite word.”

Even outside the MLS world, there remains an underlying skepticism about whether Upstream is a good idea.

Last summer, eXp Realty’s chief product and technology officer, Scott Petronis, expressed concern about having a “single point of failure” if Upstream consolidates control in one place.

And then there’s Zillow, which has a vested interest in ensuring that Upstream doesn’t succeed, given that its own lifeblood is the listings data that Upstream wants to control.

The listings giant —which has been Upstream’s fiercest critic — told federal regulators in July it was “greatly concerned” that Upstream could potentially cause “erosion of equitable access to listings data.”

The critique was part of a seven-page letter submitted to the Federal Trade Commission and U.S. Department of Justice in response to a June workshop on competition in real estate.

Zillow wrote that “members of Upstream’s board have repeatedly commented in public settings and in written communications that one goal of Upstream is to allow brokers to restrict data distribution to online portals.”

Yet regulators didn’t mention Upstream during the workshop itself.

Hahn, of 7DS Associates, finds that omission curious. “To have a national repository of some sort that was going to control access to listing data — that sounds like a big fat target for the DOJ and FTC,” he said.

Upstream’s governance prevents the company from making a profit, as does NAR’s. Once Upstream goes live in a market, it charges the MLS or brokers who enter data a fee. It can use those fees to cover operational costs. It’s also supposed to repay NAR’s initial funding; the first payment of $7.6 million is due in January.

Lange said that as of May, Upstream had commitments to cover a revenue target of $250,000 a month. But not all of those who have committed to participate are live.

“It’s not a 1, 2, 3, turn on,” Lange said. “Right now, it feels like a big Tetris puzzle. But it’s doable, and it’s happening.”

In the meantime, NAR and Upstream are facing competition from some of the very MLSs they are looking to serve.

In September, five MLSs — in Arizona, Wisconsin, Silicon Valley, Oregon and Utah — launched MLS Aligned, a platform that manages and distributes shared data.

“With 650 MLSs, we have a big industry,” said Chris Carrillo, president and CEO of MetroMLS in Wisconsin, referring to the number of MLS portals nationwide. “There’s plenty of room under this big tent to support different initiatives.”

But as projects like MLS Aligned and others launch, they may make Upstream somewhat irrelevant, Hahn said. Still, given how much money NAR has already invested, abandoning it also doesn’t make sense.

“It’s hard not to lose face if you just back away now,” he said. “Yet there isn’t a face-saving option that’s available.”

Source: https://therealdeal.com/issues_articles/nar-vs-the-naysayers/

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garynsmith · 7 years

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A response to a broker’s open letter from NAR CEO Dale Stinton

http://ift.tt/2jHmCmX

Editor’s note: After contributor Daniel Bates wrote an open letter to the new CEO at the National Association of Realtors, he received this response from current NAR CEO Dale Stinton. Stinton agreed to allow Inman to publish it.

The email has been edited slightly for style and length.

Dear Daniel,

I read your “open letter” on Inman regarding some ideas you have for the National Association of Realtors to do a better job. (You offered similar thoughts back in 2013, but regrettably, I didn’t see that one.)

Your time is valuable, and because you took the time to openly and honestly pen your thoughts, I want to acknowledge that upfront. As a 30-something broker of a small office, with a decade of experience, you are very important to me and NAR — and in no event would we purport to “judge” you, other than as a concerned, decent, core constituency.

I’m hoping the best way to address your comments is to take them one at a time, seeking to provide clarification where I can. This has ended up a much longer informational exchange than I originally intended. But my motivation is to acknowledge your point of view while providing context or clarity to the thoughts you’ve introduced.

By no means is my intent to offer a rebuttal or to suggest a right or wrong position. I think you’ll find we agree on more than you might think — I just want to begin a conversation and to let you know you’ve been heard.

Step 1: Goals

Always a good place to start. The mission statement of NAR, in brief, is to help our members ethically and successfully conduct business and protect private property rights.

The more specific priorities of President Bill Brown for 2017 are:

Preserve the Mortgage Interest Deduction (MID)

Support a reinvented stable, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and FHA, thereby preserving the secondary mortgage market and the 30 year mortgage

Preserve 1031 exchanges

Research and develop ideas which help our members plan for their financial future and retirement years

Research and develop policies and potential government actions which would allow for Trade Associations and Small Businesses to offer health care plans across state lines (7 years ago we were literally one vote from getting small business healthcare approved, afterwards Obamacare took over)

Develop the Commitment to Excellence membership strategy the NAR Board of Directors approved in November, 2016

Step 2: Build a brand

In your comments, you accurately link brand value to what members far and wide consistently express as our most sacred set of principles — the Code of Ethics. Yet there is also no single issue that has been the subject of more debate than the COE and professional standards.

More specifically, there has always been much talk about the respect for, the violation of and the challenge in enforcing that code, particularly as it relates to dispute resolution in an industry and system that self-regulates.

Many members, including me, agree with your point of view — for the brand to continue to carry value, to mean something in the future, to be a true differentiator, we must look to the principle it’s built on — what does it mean to be a member of the National Association of Realtors?

Call it a higher bar, call it a commitment to excellence, call it a renewal of our core principles — call it what you like — we need a new story to tell, one based on more stringent respect and adherence to our core principles, performance standards and subsequent actions, which demonstrate that “trusted advisor” is more than just a concept to which we aspire.

In November, the NAR Board of Directors approved a member-driven “commitment to excellence” report, which outlines a new path for our membership. Albeit voluntary, it is a step in the right direction, and time will tell if and when the desired effect will be achieved. Right now the effort is largely top-down; for it to succeed, the grassroots must demand it.

Additional information: Every couple of years, we engage a highly regarded New York trademark expert to update the literal value of the Realtor brand. The most recent valuation, about a year old, puts the big blue “R” and the term Realtor at $5 billion. Eighty-six percent of the 5-million-plus residential transactions that were completed in 2015, were completed by Realtors. The other 14 percent were split fairly evenly with 7 percent to non-Realtor licensees and 7 percent to FSBOs (for sale by owners).

Close to 70 percent of the Realtor transactions were started by “referrals.” So, is the brand effective? Does it translate to your bottom line? When your members are doing practically all of the business in the space it can’t be completely coincidental.

However, to again reinforce your views on the brand, it is my opinion that this extraordinary valuation may be based more on our sheer size, longevity and the overall reputational value of organized real estate earned over 100 plus years.

To be sure, there are plenty of our own members that still enunciate the term as “Real-a-tor”. Whether this intrinsic brand value bleeds its way down to each and every member is a fair question. But there does seem to be general agreement — raising the bar raises the brand.

Step 3: Education

To your comments about education specialties, some 25 years ago, NAR’s governing body made the decision to get out of the “education” business as it was deemed the purview of brokers, state and local associations, and our institutes, societies and councils (CRE, IREM, CCIM, CRS, CRB, RLI, WCR, SIOR).

But like many things at NAR, these things can be cyclical, and what goes around eventually comes back around.

We currently have two primary educational vehicles. The first is the Center for Specialized Real Estate (CSRE) a wholly owned not-for-profit subsidiary of NAR, which includes among others ePro, the Green Designation and Accredited Buyer’s Representative (ABR). Approximately 80,000 members take courses in these subject matter areas each year.

The other initiative we have been pursuing is Realtor University.

Started five years ago to offer a completely online master’s degree in real estate, in 2016 it was certified as an “accredited” degree granting institution. This accreditation will now allow us to pursue our real long-term goal, which is to partner with major educational institutions and universities around the country to offer Realtors online real estate-related education course work leading to college credit, certifications, associate’s degrees and even bachelor’s degrees.

(Surveys indicate that as much as 50 percent of our membership have no post high school credits.) The virtual online nature of the University will allow us to reach every member and also allows the member to work at their own pace on their own schedule.

Realtor University is funded entirely through tuition, scholarships and the accumulated reserves of CSRE — in other words, resources are allocated to the program, but none of your annual dues fund it.

Step 4: Value

As a frame of reference, Charleston Trident Association dues are $111, South Carolina dues are $165 and NAR dues are $155.

You mention one of the tangible benefits provided by SCAR is the Real Estate Forms Program. I’m glad you find value in the forms program because in partnership with our colleagues at SCAR, NAR is currently paying all of the costs for the forms software and libraries that you are using.

Additionally, we have negotiated discounted rates with ZipLogix (the national forms company provider, of which NAR owns 30 percent) for an e-signature solution, the mobile version, as well as a broker program.

I’m sorry you do not find value in what we call the “affinity” program. We have 35 separate corporate programs where we’ve negotiated member rates from the Chrysler deal to Dell, to FedEx, to DocuSign — and a bunch more. All I can tell you is 875,000 members took advantage of at least one of these programs in 2016.

Thank you for the mention of RPR (Realtors Property Resource), which grew by 18 percent in 2016, has 635,000 user accounts and is available to 1,120,000 members.

Website traffic statistics on total user sessions grew 83 percent in 2016 and exceeded 10 million individual sessions. I hope your board decides to take another look at it, since 90 percent of all the local associations and MLSs are signed up.

I’m sure we can resolve the “data use” issue as RPR does not resell or otherwise generate commerce from your data. That’s why it’s a no-cost service to our members — and remember, you can participate on RPR using your member (NRDS) ID, whether or not your local association chooses to participate.

As mentioned in the first section, we are working very hard to figure out how to get better health care coverage to our members — who, as you stated, are largely independent contractors. We’re encouraged by the administration’s statements about creating competition across state lines, as that is similar to what we were trying to accomplish with the small business health care program we were one vote away from getting approved right before the market collapse back in 2007-2008.

Step 5: Wasteful spending

Since you suggested the single largest source of wasteful spending is lobbying, most of the specific information I offer will come in this section.

Respectfully, I do want to correct your point about spending $100 billion on our lobbying since 1999. I think you meant to say $100 million over that 17-year period.

Even so, that’s a lot of money, and we need to be accountable for it.

I am pleased to tell you that when we talk about getting things done (or, in a lot of cases, keeping things from happening) in Washington, the NAR team does not “grease any wheels.” The old-school tactic of “hammer them until they submit” or the slimy “buy them off” approach does not work in D.C. any more, at least not for how NAR operates.

Our approach is sublimely simplistic: We have a reputation on the Hill, second to none, for doing our homework, providing the highest-quality research and applying reasoned conclusions to our arguments.

More often than not, this collegial and far more intellectual approach is extremely well-received and appreciated, since many of our peers and others still employ a fear based threat infused style of advocacy. (It does not hurt that we have over 1.2 million members.)

Feet on the ground will always be worth more than money. And we have many more feet than you realize.

As a result of our efforts the last several years to engage the public in our legislative and regulatory causes, we now have more than 8 million consumers and property owners in a massive database who have indicated they are ready and willing to be part of our call-for-action network should we call on them for help.

This virtual property and homeownership coalition will be critical to us going forward, as the rules and methods of advocating in Washington are certainly fluid.

Additional information: At any point in time, we are monitoring 35 to 40 federal legislative and regulatory issues that could either help or harm real estate and real property issues. You will never hear how we resolve many of these threats because our goal is to make them go away without drawing attention to them, embarrassing anyone or “outing” any of the folks who helped us.

You asked for some specific examples of political accomplishments that would not have just eventually worked themselves out if NAR never existed — here are some we can talk about that I think will resonate:

2008 – Carried Interest: NAR successfully convinced Congress to shelve a planned tax increase on real estate partnerships.

2008 – We kept alive and helped reform the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP), keeping it renewed for an additional five years through 2017.

2008 – Commercial Real Estate: Tenants in Common; NAR successfully negotiated an exemption proposal with the Securities and Exchange Commission that would permit experienced commercial real estate professionals to provide real estate services to their clients interested in TIC securities.

2009 – Protecting Realtors Business Interests and Activities: Banks in Real Estate; after eight years of continuous struggle to convince Congress that real estate is not financial in nature and banks should not be allowed in the real estate brokerage business, NAR achieved its objective. On March 11th, 2009, The Omnibus Appropriations Bill, H.R. 1105, was signed into law, and with it a declaration that, going forward, neither real estate brokerage or real estate management can be classified as a financial activity.

2009 – Expanding Housing Opportunities: A NAR-initiated First-time Homebuyer Tax Credit; H.R. 1, the “American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009,” was signed by the President on February 17, 2009. Included was an $8,000 tax credit for first-time homebuyers. Over one-third of all properties sold in 2009 used the First Time Homebuyers Tax Credit. The credit was extended to April 2010 and included a move-up buyer’s credit after more work from NAR.

2009 – Extended GSE Loan Limits another year

2010 – Extended FHA Loan Limits for 2 more years (through 2013)

2013 – Preserved Mortgage Cancellation/IRS income recognition

2014 – Convinced GSEs, the FHA and HUD to relax credit standards and to be responsible but reasonable

2015 – Convinced FHA to lower premiums by 50 basis points while still being fiscally responsible

2015 – Reauthorized TRIA (Terrorism Risk Insurance Act) for 6 years

2016 – Convinced Congress to pass new FHA/GSE Condo Rules

We continue to advocate for the survival of Fannie, Freddie and FHA until intelligent, responsible reform can occur, thereby assuring the continuation of a secondary mortgage market and the 30 year mortgage

The invention of the Realtor Party in 2011 and the addition of a $40-per-member dues increase is what I’m certain you’re referring to when you observe that you are now required to pay for additional advocacy activity.

The genesis of this major strategic move was the conclusion that although we were highly confident of our abilities to monitor and influence federal legislative and regulatory events, those who would seek to adversely affect the real estate marketplace were shifting their strategies to the state and local levels.

Many of our state and local associations are not particularly experienced in combating these forces in their own backyards, so the Realtor Party strategy was born. Of the $40 per member collected, each year $27 of programs, grants and subsidies are distributed back to the state and local associations to “fit them up” to protect and defend real estate markets and private property rights in their own backyards.

Over the last five years, this has resulted in 16,500 campaigns nationwide helping 1,026 local associations with their local real estate issues. Our success rate is right at 75 percent.

This is all well and good, but what does it mean to someone less interested in condos and residential stuff, with a more specific interest in land sales and land use? Fair question.

In the last several years, the Realtor Party has funded 14 major land use initiatives in South Carolina that were delivered through your board, the Charleston Trident Association of Realtors. They involved smart growth on common ground, local zoning issues, impact fees, rental restrictions, vacant property registry, neighborhood revitalization, urban growth boundaries, school of the future and a diversity initiative.

Combined with a number of other statewide land use initiatives, the South Carolina Association and your board to date has received more than $240,000 in assistance to address these important community needs. I’d like to think that these activities have contributed in some way to a better marketplace for your land-based niche and expertise.

As to your comments on top-level domains (TLDs) — the .realtor offering resulted in 100,000 members signing up in the first year (2015) when it was free, and 72,000 have renewed their domains in 2016. Given there are more than 1.2 million Realtors, your comment about the program being a huge failure seems a little harsh — but it is true we had hoped for several hundred thousand.

The one mitigating factor I offer up is that the entire program was and is paid for by the Realtors Information Network (RIN) a wholly owned subsidiary of NAR’s that is paid royalties to oversee the realtor.com operating agreement we have with News Corp.

Yes, NAR resources are allocated to the program through RIN — however, none of your annual NAR dues are used to pay for the .realtor program. As is the case with a number of our other major initiatives (Credit Union, Real Estate Technology Incubator and SentriLock Lock Boxes, to name a few) all of them are solidly in the black and require no use of member dues.

Step 6: Shake things up

I have not been the CEO for 36 years; this is my 12th year as CEO — but I have worked for four other NAR CEOs in the 25 years before I became the chief staff person.

Out of everything in which you’ve expressed an opinion, this is the only one where I will push back when you characterize our more involved volunteers somewhat pejoratively as “cheerleaders.”

I estimate that between NAR’s volunteer positions and other assignments, those of the 54 states and territories, and the 1,200 local associations of Realtors, there are somewhere in the neighborhood of 20,000 to 25,000 active governing members who give an extraordinary amount of time to upholding Realtor values and helping their communities and fellow members be more successful.

It is true: They usually are very positive and upbeat about contributing to the Realtor organization and family, but they also are not shy about telling us when they think we’ve screwed up or we’re off track.

I am faithful to them and have great respect for their volunteerism.

And I have a similar respect for you for stepping up to be heard. I promise you — we are listening and want to know what you or others are thinking!

To that end, you can find me on Facebook.

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