A pre-market listing is any advertising that does not appear on either the MLS (The Market) or its syndicators*, such as Zillow.
While the MLS is, itself, technically The Market, effectively The Market also includes all of the MLS syndicators who automatically get a feed from the MLS.
Once a listing appears on them, they start counting the number of Days On Market – DOM. And in order to reset the DOM, a listing would need to be pulled for 30-60 days. And even then, it may be a searchable variable to see if the listing is truly new or a re-listing.
So first advertising your home on an independent platform is a lesser commitment, which can ‘test the waters’ before putting your home on “The Market”. In actuality, of course, the moment that you make any public statement that your home is for sale, it is on the market.
Note: The DOM is a crucial psychological factor in affecting the perception of your home’s value. From a perception standpoint, think of DOM like the odometer on a used car that you are selling.
- 1 Week DOM = 5,000 miles
- 1 Month DOM = 30,000 miles
- 3 Months DOM = 75,000 miles
- 6 Months DOM = 120,000 miles
This is not a commentary on the quality of your home, necessarily, but only the psychological impact on how the market’s ‘feel’ is affected. For this reason, it is crucial that a seller get as much prep work done as possible prior to listing on The Market. Other platforms, however, are less likely, or not at all, to have an affect in counting DOM. And so a seller can get some ‘practice’ in before listing out on the MLS or Zillow. Moreover, your home may well sell via being listed on other platforms!
Here is a more full consideration of the DOM to Odometer analogy.
*Two websites, realtor.com and zillow.com, account for about 65% of all home searches. The rest of the MLS syndicators account for approximately another 20%. And the independent sites account for the remaining 15%, with Facebook Marketplace taking about a third (4-5%) of that 15%.