When I started in the real estate business back in 1981, one of the highlights of our week was the MLS house tour when all the new homes were open to the Realtors. 

At that time, there were about 120 Realtors and on any given Wednesday you could see as many as 80 agents looking at the new listings.  It was the only way we had to stay current with the market.

We had thick MLS books that had one grainy picture of the house and no other details to speak of.  The only way you could really see the house was to personally visit the home. 

I recently had a house on Realtor tour and the owner was very upset because we only had 20 agents (out of 1,400) show up during the Realtor tour.  I tried to explain that because of the Internet, great photography, google maps and virtual tours, Realtors can look at a home online and get all the information they could possibly need. 

Many Boards throughout America don’t have weekly house tours.  I was speaking to a friend in Chicago and she said they would have a greyhound bus every Wednesday for tour and now they don’t have a tour at all. 

One thing we can be sure of is that things will continue to change over and over again.