The data keeps pouring in: the U.S. homes market is in trouble. In May, existing home sales were down 15.9% in the past year and new home sales were down 40%. During hard times such as these, it’s not uncommon to see an industry using the ostrich approach: putting their heads in the sand and hoping things get better. The real estate industry, however, is doing exactly the opposite: agents and their brokerages are working harder than ever to promote and market their listings.

Today Prudential Real Estate and Oodle announced a partnership in which Prudential will feed its listings to Oodle to get featured distribution across the Oodle Network (Oodle and our over 200 local and national partners). We believe this deal foreshadows a broader trend in the real estate industry as it becomes more open.

Not too long ago, agents and their representing brokers feared sharing their listings — listings could be found only on MLS systems or on the broker/agent websites. Today, brokerage houses are working hard to ensure that their listings show up across the web. Wherever users search, they want their listings to be there. We expect to see many more deals like this in the industry and that other brokerages houses will want to tap Oodle’s strong local distribution. Hats off to Pru for being the trendsetter!