SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - Yellowknife's population needs to grow more before residents can expect to see Yellowknife properties listed on the Multiple Listing Service (MLS), says one local realtor.

James Clark, owner of Homelife Sunrise Real Estate, and Rod Stirling, a realtor with Coldwell Banker, say they haven't been lobbied by clients to join the website of the Multiple Listing Service. - Guy Quenneville/NNSL photo

Last week, the Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA) ratified a 10-year agreement with the federal Competition Bureau allowing home sellers to pay only for the services they want from their real estate agents.

Prior to the agreement, homeowners looking to list their houses on mls.ca – which is widely used by realtors and home sellers across Canada to view properties for sale around the country – could only do so as part of an overall package from realtors.

The new agreement means sellers can just pay realtors a flat rate for the MLS listing only and sell their houses themselves, theoretically lowering the cost of selling.

But the implications of that decision are not felt North of 60 because Yellowknife properties are not currently listed on mls.ca, and neither Homelife Sunrise Real Estate nor Coldwell Banker has been asked to join the site by their clients.

"They're happy that we have a local site," said Rod Stirling, a realtor with Coldwell Banker. "It's more specific to Yellowknife and Northern properties."

"We haven't lobbied and we certainly, in my belief, haven't been lobbied to have properties on there," echoed James Clark, owner of Homelife Sunrise Real Estate. "My feeling is that our local sites provide much more information than you can get from a national (website).

"If our population base grows exponentially, then we may see that in the future. But right now, we're looking at a fairly small market to get to that point."

Stirling said there are never more than 100 properties for sale in Yellowknife at one time.

But "if somebody opened up a (discount) outfit and they wanted to do that, they (could)," said Stirling of the flat-fee option.

Jaimee Imrie thinks they should.

As someone who was recently looking to rent a house with two friends, Imrie said Yellowknife ought to be on mls.ca.

"It is a capitol city. It's not a very large city, but that kind of thing would help us get up to speed with the rest of the world," said Imrie. "Right now, I know there's a lot of property sales going on and a lot of the real estate agents here must make a lot of money.

"If you were able to list it yourself up here instead of just typing something up on YKTrader, that would probably really improve the property market."

Attracting more people to live in the North could be made easier by having Yellowknife on the site, she added.

"You're getting way more exposure that way," she said. "... There' s so many things in this town, so many resources that we only know about internally."

Like those before him, Yellowknife Chamber of Commerce President Warren McLeod has listed expanding Yellowknife's population among his chief priorities.

While MLS could help with that effort, "if you're looking at a specific location like Yellowknife, I imagine just Googling local real estate businesses would suffice," said McLeod.

Clark said the same thing.

"You search 'Yellowknife real estate' on Google (and) boom, we're there," said Clark.

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