Midwest Real Estate Data (MRED), Chicagoland’s multiple listing service (MLS), announced today that its President and CEO, Russ Bergeron, will be participating in today’s Green Mortgage Appraisal Roundtable in Washington, DC. Bergeron will be headlining a panel discussion and sharing in discussions before the White House Council on Environmental Quality. The Roundtable is meant to provide an opportunity for the exchange of information about the valuation of energy efficiency, renewable energy and green (high performance) building in single family homes, including the challenges of assigning a value to energy savings.

Last year, President Obama released a Climate Action Plan. In order to advance ongoing efforts and as a follow-up to the Green Mortgage Roundtable held in July, 2013, the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) in partnership with the Council on Environmental Quality has invited appraisers, lenders, Realtors®, federal agencies and other key stakeholders to this meeting. MRED and Bergeron are taking this opportunity to work with industry partners to help develop specific recommendations to address barriers to valuation in areas such as appraisal standards, data collection, analytical tools, and document standardization.

MRED is a leader in the MLS industry regarding Green/Smart home issues. MRED has made home energy costs accessible on the property listings in its MLS system, providing real estate brokers with valuable information for their clients, and appraisers with important data to help establish a credible opinion of value. Appraisers are also better equipped to do sales comparison and income approach valuation methods when this data is available to them.

“MRED’s participation in this Roundtable is an extension of a mission we already have in place – proactive involvement in cutting-edge issues that are most relevant to our customers” said Bergeron. “We are supportive of White House initiatives such as the Green Button data standard, and are proud that we are one of the first MLSs to provide a Green Button type application by making home energy costs accessible in property listings.”