The High Road Papers - Latest Comments in Open Letter to Homes.com

Re: Open Letter to Homes.com

Larry Jensen — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 10:48:42 -0000

As far as I know, both State and Federal DNC rules (they are not laws) Do Not Apply to Business to Business marketing. Only Business to Personal.

That said, if you do request them to add you to their own DNC list, they should, but again, they don't have to.

At least that is what I was told when reporting a business to the DNC list

Re: Open Letter to Homes.com

Aaron@HR Software — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 11:39:23 -0000

That's a nice letter. I wonder if anyone from homes.com even knows what a blog is? Most likely they just pay people on a commission basis to call every agent over and over again. The rules of cold calling are something like "7 calls to a conversion" -- so I would expect a couple more calls before they give up.

<abbr></abbr><abbr>Aaron´s last blog post..Small Business Economic Bailout Plan</abbr>

Re: Open Letter to Homes.com

Maureen Francis — Mon, 21 Jan 2008 19:14:22 -0000

I have a homes.com site. I freely admit that I hate them and have for years. I cannot get them to stop calling me even though I have made the same requests you have.

Re: Open Letter to Homes.com

Jay - The Phoenix Real Estate — Fri, 18 Jan 2008 15:36:43 -0000

RealEstateVoices.com is run through HomeThinking.com, not Homes.com. Believe me, I've got not relationship with Homes.com.

Besides, even if I did... from the DNC regulations:

"One caveat: if a consumer asks a company not to call, the company may not call, even if there is an established business relationship. Indeed, a company may not call a consumer - regardless of whether the consumer's number is on the registry - if the consumer has asked to be put on the company's own do not call list."

Re: Open Letter to Homes.com

Derek — Fri, 18 Jan 2008 15:28:29 -0000

Isn't homes.com the owners to some site a bunch of agents were using a few years ago to bookmark blog articles.

I remember when the carnival of real estate came out, several bloggers were submitting their articles to that site as well.

If they are the owners, depending on their TOS and if you ever bookmarked one of your articles there, you may in fact have an established business relationship. I do not know the name of the site, but I think it may have been realestatevoices.com or something like that?

I know Jim the Tomato and Mary McKnight used to post articles on it at times so if that's not the right site, email one of them and maybe they can remember the site name and see who the owners are.

Re: Open Letter to Homes.com

Atlanta Luxury Homes — Fri, 18 Jan 2008 09:45:58 -0000

Great post, Jay. I feel your pain...

If these numnuts would take 5 seconds and do a Google search they would realize that they are wasting their time and especially OURS! Maybe if enough people blog about it and report them, they will get the hint.

Re: Open Letter to Homes.com

Greg Tracy — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 23:41:45 -0000

No Kidding!

I understand the whole philosophy that you get 5 "No"'s before a "Yes", but these guys think that you get a "Yes" after something like 748,312 "No"'s.

Harrassment has never really gained traction as a means of acquiring business... interesting.

Re: Open Letter to Homes.com

Bass Lake Real Estate — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 15:34:49 -0000

You are right Jay every company that provides phone service provides a directory and now place this directory on the internet. What kind of business can operate with an unlisted number?
Maybe we should start tying up their phone lines by calling them to try and sell them a listing we have. If we all called them at the same rate they called us, maybe just maybe they would get the point!

Re: Open Letter to Homes.com

Chris Lengquist — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 23:00:48 -0000

I still think ti would be fun to get their 800 number and have agents from all over the country flood their lines. We'd run up their bill and waste their time.

But alas, it wastes our time, too.

Re: Open Letter to Homes.com

Michael Price — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 16:34:03 -0000

Shenanigans like this make it hard to be a real estate tech vendor. Jay, our telemarketing staff will be calling later today. We found your number on a bathroom wall in NYC. I checked, you have no protection from the DNC on that one. :)

Re: Open Letter to Homes.com

Jason Brown — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 15:23:28 -0000

You and I were thinking the same thing...

Re: Open Letter to Homes.com

Jason Brown — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 15:21:43 -0000

Jim - That would mean that any phone number listed in whitepages(dot)com is free game, so somehow I hope that is misinformation.

Jay - Thanks for posting this - it's exactly what I was tempted to post on my own blog. I have asked House(dot)com nicely to stop calling. I have told them rudely. I have hung up on them. (In the rare moment that I had the free time) I let them go on for 10 minutes and THEN I said "no thanks". You should have heard the response. Then I got hung up on. Another time I said, can you hold on and I'll get "Jason" - I then sat the phone down and came back some time later to hear a dial tone. But last week enough was enough - they called me again and after I told them, for the 100th time, that (1) I'm not interested and (2) my number is on the no-call registry, I got online and filled out the form reported them. I haven't had a call since (fingers crossed).

Next on the list: those people "affiliated with Yahoo, the search engine" who call me almost as much as Homes(dot)com.

Re: Open Letter to Homes.com

Jay - The Phoenix Real Estate — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 15:20:26 -0000

"they tell me that because they found my number on the web, they can call"

What a load of crap. I'm no attorney, but I see absolutely nothing in the DNC rules that exempts a number "found on the web".

If that were true, there wouldn't be any point in the DNC. Just about every number on the planet can be found on the web...

Re: Open Letter to Homes.com

Jim Duncan — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 14:34:36 -0000

Good luck with this. I've tried for years and years to get them to stop calling. When I tell them to put me on the Do Not Call list, they tell me that because they found my number on the web, they can call. I want part of the fine.