What is mls.ca in Canada, what does it stand for and how does it work?

What is mls.ca? MLS.ca is the official site of the Canadian Real Estate Association. It is the gateway to all the listings across Canada.

As stated at the mls.ca website "This web site is an advertising vehicle provided by REALTORS® across Canada to help market properties. This web site is not an MLS® system. Please contact a REALTOR® for complete details about all properties listed here."

Almost all local board mls systems provide data to mls.ca to facilitate the publics search of mls listings in their particular areas.



Most real estate boards in Canada (the Toronto Real Estate Board - TREB - being one of them), upload partial listing information to MLS.ca on a regular basis.

It is important to know that mls.ca is for the public and only provides limited information about the particular listings. Realtors utilize their local mls system to search and find mls listings and they have access to far more details and information about a particular listing than what is shown on mls.ca There are many reasons for this. One is the privacy act. Realtors have access on mls listings to the sellers names, financing incentives and other relevant information that is also necessary to draft an agreement of purchase and sale.

The information that agents use at their local board level (such as TREB)is much more current and we also have access to many years of historical price and listing information. As well, this is our current, 'real time' mls system for all the local listings.

You may notice that some listings show the address of the property and others do not. This is not a error or glitch in the system. It is the listing agent along with the sellers consent that decides if the address of a property should be made available on mls.ca

One reason that an agent may not want to show an address of a listing is so the potential purchaser would contact the listing agent for further information. Once the listing agent has the customer's email or name or address, the agent may attempts to convince that buyer into working with the listing agent for this and other potential properties. As long as my sellers give consent, all of my listings show the municipal address of the property. I feel that it's important that the potential buyer knows exactly where the property is located before they make further inquiries.

This way, the buyer does not waste their time following up on properties in areas that they are not interested in purchasing. This also means that any inquires that I receive on a property that you would have listed with me are more serious and qualified compared to other inquiries.

You may wish to navigate to mls.ca and you may use this link to go to mls.ca

You may wish to read more information about mls.ca

If you have any questions about mls.ca or TREB please email me.

Thank you,

Mark