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I'm in the industry, although not a realtor.

One of the problems I see with taking brokers and agents out of the equation is that the likely replacement is going to be lawyers.

Buying a house is a huge investment. Sure, if the buyer and seller are both honest, its a relatively simple transaction and everyone comes out happy in the end. However, anyone who's been on ebay knows that this isn't always the case.

Inserting brokers and agents into the transaction doesn't necessarily fix all the potential problems, but it does address a lot of them. Where agents and brokers are "overpaid" is when the home being sold is very desirable, and the buyer is knowledgeable and either prequalified or has cash. The reality, however, is that just about every home for sale has problems and quirks and most buyers either don't understand financing, or have problems getting it, or have never gone through a transaction of this magnitude before. Could be, also, that the buyer is moving into an unfamiliar area and needs the expertise of someone who knows the neighborhoods to guide their purchase.

In those cases, the brokers and agents work very hard and when you consider the probable alternative - getting lawyers involved instead (which I understand is already part of the process in many states), their commission doesn't sound all that extravagant.

I'm no fan of realtors, and they certainly shouldn't be mandated, but I'm not sure that this alternative is better for buyers and sellers. I guess a lot would depend on the way the site is structured.

Beyond that, I'm not sure how legal this site would be in all states. I'm not a lawyer either, but if this is just another FSBO site, those haven't been very effective yet, largely because of the problems above.

Beyond that, I'm not sure how legal this site would be in all states.

Offering what looks like an appraisal probably breaks the law. You must be licenced in the state and you must visit the property. If they don't charge for it directly, they may get away with it. I really don't quite understand where they plan on making money yet, by ads?

What I don't like is the monopolistic nature of the real estate business.

If people want an agent's services in the instances you set out, fine, let them hire one. But as it stands now, there really is no viable alternative to paying big commission fees regardless of how much work the sale involved and regardless of whether the agent added any value to the process.

For example, I'm selling a property now and of course it has to be listed on MLS. There really is no practical alternative. That requires an agent. No choice. So sometimes the commission turns out to be just what it costs to get access to MLS.

Once MLS gets busted open, and it will, (IOW, it will get replaced with a system that does the job and does it better), agents will have to make the case for what value they are adding to the process else be OBE.