Regulators Probe Quebec Listings Platform's Data-Sharing

Canada’s Competition Bureau—the Canadian equivalent of the Federal Trade Commission—has opened an investigation into whether the Quebec Professional Association for Real Estate Brokers (QPAREB) and its Societe Centris subsidiary have engaged in anti-competitive practices that have stifled the development of online brokerage services in Canada.

The investigation is focused on the data-sharing restrictions allegedly imposed by Societe Centris on its Centris.ca listing platform, which brands itself “the most visited real estate website in Quebec.”

The Competition Bureau obtained a Federal Court order last week requiring QPAREB to provide the regulators with documents related to the confidentiality of data held by the Centris platform, according to a report in the Toronto Star.

The federal watchdog told the newspaper on Monday that it is trying to determine whether the trade group and its subsidiary have engaged in practices that have prevented the development of innovative online brokerage services that could compete with Centris.

The bureau said it also wants information related to “decision-making processes” tied to QPAREB’s “potential dissemination and sharing of real estate data and the effects this could have on competition in the Quebec real estate market.”

“We are cooperating fully with the Competition Bureau in answering its questions. Respect for the rule of law is paramount and we believe that our practices comply with applicable regulations,” said Marc Lacasse, president of QPAREB’s board of directors, in a statement.

Most of the association’s data sharing activity is linked to a multiple listing service (MLS), where it collects Quebec real estate transaction data that it makes available to its 14K broker and agency members, according to the star.

MLS systems contain listings, sales figures, archival information and neighborhood descriptions entered by brokers as homes of list for sale or sold. Access to this data, which is not available to the public, is one of the most valuable perks offered by real estate associations like QPAREB to their members.

The Competition Bureau previously challenged a regional board’s restrictive grip on MLS data in 2011, when it brought a complaint against the Toronto Regional Real Estate Board (TREBB) in an effort to make the data publicly accessible on brokers’ websites.

When Canada’s Federal Court of Appeals upheld the Competition Bureau’s ruling that TREBB’s data should be made public, but the regional board took the case to the Supreme Court of Canada, arguing that publication of the date would violate privacy and copyrights.

The Supreme Court refused to hear the case, clearing the way for TREBB’s MLS date to appear on other websites that are password-protected and typically open to an agent’s clients or site subscribers.

The Competition Bureau cited the TREBB case as a precedent in its court filings regarding the Quebec brokers association.