Who We Are
View the Who We Are Brochure
MRIS® stands for Metropolitan Regional Information Systems, Inc. MRIS is the premiere online real estate
information service for over 60,000 real estate professionals in Maryland, Washington DC, Northern Virginia, and
parts of West Virginia and Pennsylvania. In 2005, MRIS facilitated the sale of more than 191,000 properties,
translating to more than $200-million in daily sales volume.
What is a Multiple Listing Service (MLS)? An MLS is a shared computerized database containing all of the
properties (listings) for sale by participating real estate brokerages in a given geographical area. It is a
business to business forum created to enable real estate professionals to publish and distribute information
relating to properties they list for sale, and to research and present property-related information to their
clients seeking to buy real estate properties.
In addition to the descriptive information provided by each listing broker, an MLS collects and makes all
of the background available on a given property-including tax records, amenities, price, selling and listing
contacts, photos and maps--available to its members. An MLS is responsible for keeping the information timely
and accurate, and for providing an environment for sharing this information among its subscribers. In
addition, as a business operating in the highly competitive and fast-moving real estate environment, the MLS
also is responsible for providing value-add features that help its subscribers market their listings.
Cooperation is key to the success of an MLS. Licensed brokers and agents agree to cooperate in sharing their
information with one another as an integral component of their participating in an MLS. When brokers and agents
cooperate, consumers benefit. When real estate practitioners share their listings with one another, they are
able to gain massive exposure for that property through the MLS, and the client-consumers trying to buy property
benefit from the practitioners' cooperation by getting access to the listings of the various participating
professionals - giving them access to more choices. Knowing that listings originate with licensed brokers
provides a degree of accountability for the substance and accuracy of the listing, since the legal and
professional rules governing the real estate professional's business, as well as the MLS rules and regulations,
apply to each real estate professional listing properties on the MLS.
So, MRIS is the name of an MLS? Yes, in fact, MRIS is the largest MLS in the nation. MRIS is owned by 25 Shareholder REALTOR® Associations spanning most of Maryland, all of DC, Northern Virginia, and
parts of West Virginia and Pennsylvania, 22,000 square miles in all.
MRIS has over 60,000 "customers" (licensed real estate brokers, agents and appraisers). MRIS customers currently
have access to almost 50,000 active listings, an archive of over 1,325,000 "comparable" and "sold" properties and
in excess of 4-million public records containing tax information about properties throughout the region.
MRIS provides its customers with the tools they need to grow their business, including a computer application
called Keystone. Keystone enables agents selling property to enter the listing information and photos into the
MLS so that they can be displayed to other MRIS agents and, through them, to potential buyers. Another MRIS
computer application, Matrix, allows agents to search the available listings so that they can share the results
with their buyers and sellers. As part of its MLS service, MRIS seeks out and collects a variety of information
and content that enhances the listings posted by brokers, and that provides its customers with tools that
ultimately enable them to serve the consumers better.
More than 100 people are employed by MRIS in specialties ranging from Internet Technology, Product Development,
and Data Integration to Customer Support, Compliance, Marketing, Human Resources, Communications and Education.
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