Sound Off: How will the Bay Area’s shelter-in-place edict affect open houses and how properties are marketed?

Q: “How will the Bay Area’s shelter-in-place edict affect open houses and how properties are marketed?”

A: San Francisco Association of Realtors has suspended broker tours and has strongly recommended that no open houses are to be held for three weeks. We are following that edict and I expect most real estate professionals will as well.

SFAR has offered realtors the option to put listings on hold on MLS so as to not have them accrue ‘days on market’. This is helpful to sellers and we hope Zillow and Redfin will offer similar options. SFAR is also allowing agents to temporarily add in links to Virtual Tours under Open House Comments in the MLS, which is helpful as well.

We are promoting video and virtual tours of our listings as much as possible and I think this experience will compel agents towards using more digital tools — if they weren’t already - to market listings, since it’s so useful to have in a time like this.

Vanessa Hatvany Kitchen, Compass, 415-447-6258, vanessa@teamhatvany.com.

A: Given the shelter-in-place orders, open houses in San Francisco, including broker opens, have been canceled. In the Bay Area where open houses have become an integral part of selling a home, Realtors and sellers need to find alternative ways to expose properties to potential buyers. Buyers and agents will have the continued ability to view online listings in the MLS and with the multitude of apps available. Beyond that, marketing of homes will be somewhat restricted.

In the current circumstances, showings will be limited, but still possible. What is uncertain, is whether buying or selling a home is considered an essential business under the local governmental orders.

There are circumstances where a seller needs...