Congress Is Probing Private Listings. Here's What Sellers Need to Know

A House Judiciary subcommittee let an August 5 deadline pass without public comment after demanding answers from Compass and a major Chicago-area multiple listing service about a deal that could expand private home listings to a national scale. The silence from both Congress and the companies involved hasn't quieted the underlying questions — and for anyone planning to sell a home, those questions matter.

What Congress Is Actually Looking At

In late July, Rep. Scott Fitzgerald (R-WI), chair of the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Administrative State, Regulatory Reform, and Antitrust, sent letters to Compass CEO Robert Reffkin and Rebecca Jensen, CEO of Midwest Real Estate Data (MRED), the MLS serving the Chicago region. The letters requested a briefing on a deal the two companies announced in April: a partnership allowing Compass's so-called Private Exclusives listings to flow through MRED's database and reach buyers nationwide — a significant expansion for a service that has historically been regional.

Fitzgerald's stated concern goes beyond the deal itself. His letters, obtained and reported by Realtor.com News, raise the possibility that the Compass-MRED arrangement could "incentivize brokers to push sellers into private listings." He also flagged the risk of dual-agency transactions, where a single agent represents both the buyer and the seller — a setup that, by definition, limits the seller's access to independent representation.

MRED said publicly that it intended to respond to the committee. Compass declined to comment on the congressional inquiry altogether. Neither Fitzgerald nor ranking member Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) issued statements once the deadline expired.

Compass's Defense — and What It Reveals

Reffkin used the company's second-quarter earnings call, held the evening before the congressional deadline, to mount a robust defense of the Private Exclusives model. He reported that web sessions originating from Chicago — where Compass has the most Coming Soon listings — were up 111% year over year, citing that as evidence of consumer demand for the format.

He went further, characterizing the MLS system itself as anticompetitive. In his telling, MLSs are controlled by Compass's competitors and function as local monopolies that dictate how brokerages can operate. He said he intends to bring competitive pressure to bear on the MLS model.

Whether or not that argument resonates in a congressional hearing room, sellers should pay attention to what it reveals: Compass's core business strategy is built around keeping listings inside its own network for as long as possible before broader exposure. Understanding that dynamic is essential to evaluating any conversation with a Compass agent about how to list your home.

The Data on Private Listings and Seller Outcomes

Reffkin's defense rests heavily on seller preference and network demand. The research, however, points in a different direction.

Bright MLS, which covers the mid-Atlantic region, published findings in 2025 showing that private listings take longer to sell and produce no measurable price advantage for sellers compared to homes listed on the open market. Zillow's own research reached a similar conclusion. The pattern suggests that limiting early exposure to a single brokerage's network — even a large one — tends to reduce competition among buyers, which is precisely the mechanism that drives sale prices up.

The logic isn't complicated: more qualified buyers seeing your home at the same time creates pressure to bid. Fewer buyers, or buyers introduced sequentially rather than simultaneously, reduces that pressure. A private listing may feel exclusive, but exclusivity in this context often means fewer competing offers.

It's also worth noting the legislative direction. Washington state and Connecticut both tightened their laws around private listings in 2026. The New York General Assembly passed a similar bill. That's three states moving toward greater transparency requirements, not fewer — a signal that lawmakers in multiple jurisdictions are skeptical of the seller benefits being claimed.

What This Means If You're Preparing to Sell

None of this means private listings are always the wrong choice. There are legitimate reasons some sellers prefer limited early exposure — privacy concerns, timing flexibility, or avoiding the stigma of a listing that sits too long. Those are real considerations worth discussing with your agent.

But "private listing" should never be the default, and it should never be presented to you as the obvious path without a clear explanation of the tradeoffs. If an agent suggests keeping your home off the MLS or limiting its public marketing phase, ask directly: what does the data say about final sale prices for private listings versus open-market listings in this zip code? A good agent will have an answer. If they can't provide one, that's information too.

The congressional probe adds a layer of accountability to a practice that has largely operated outside public scrutiny. Even if the inquiry produces no immediate regulatory change, the attention it's drawing to dual-agency risk and information asymmetry is useful for sellers to understand. When an agent represents both sides of a transaction, their incentive is to close — not necessarily to maximize your proceeds.

If you want a baseline for what your home might fetch on the open market before committing to any listing strategy, running an independent estimate through a tool like the one Local Home Buyers USA offers gives you a number to anchor that conversation. Know your floor before anyone tells you what your ceiling should be.