A duplex-up at 1623 W Barry Ave is listed in the MLS at $2,500 a month. Coldwell Banker’s Jennifer Witt has the listing.
domu spotlighted the property at its blog, citing the rent at $2,300 a month, with a contact phone different from the listing agent’s.
The same contact phone – which doesn’t trace to any identifiable individual – appears in a Craigslist ad for the property, where the rent is listed at $2,200 a month.
Earlier today we were forwarded an e-mail received from domu by someone who had posted an apartment ad at Craigslist. domu’s e-mail was addressed to a Craigslist e-mail address.
The domu e-mail began as follows: “you have received a complimentary two-week listing on domu.com.” The Craigslist advertiser reports being told by domu that the listing was a “Broker Reciprocity” listing from the MLS – where the advertiser had not listed it. The advertiser’s Craigslist ad contained the standard notation that “it’s NOT ok to contact this poster with services or other commercial interests.”
We investigated a number of domu ads and found a similar pattern – a Craigslist ad followed by a domu ad. Some of the domu ads had contact info that traced to rental services, and one had availability stated as 1/4/11 – odd, given domu’s claim that it serves up “fresh listings from landlords.”
The vast majority of domu’s listings do not, in fact, connect renters with landlords but route them to the brokers who placed the listings in the MLS.
Anyone seeking a rental can find many more rental listings at broker sites than are available at domu. And YoChicago’s at-a-glance apartment lists and maps connect renters directly with more downtown properties than domu does. Far more properties.
What’s going on here? Is the Barry listing another domu Craigslist scrape? Is domu a Web site that’s worth visiting?