Homebuyers could soon benefit from a new listing portal with all the online bells and whistles they've come to expect -- but with better service on the ground.

The new search engine, Nestfully, will offer up-to-the-moment pricing information, plus the ability to search based on your individual needs. You'll be able to schedule showings, obtain information on recent sales and, most importantly, link up with the agent who listed the property for sale.

The site will offer a "differentiated search experience" based on how people actually search for homes, the company claims. Users will have the ability to apply any number of filters: price, number of bedrooms and bathrooms, acreage, garage size -- even places with a swimming pool.

If it takes hold, the portal holds great promise for consumers. But it is also a major step forward for local realty professionals who want to regain control of their listings.

To date, agents have all but subjugated themselves to nationwide syndicators that publish listings as their own, even though they take their data directly from local multiple listing services. These so-called aggregators sometimes allow other agents to purchase prominent ads on listings they did not create and of which they have no direct knowledge.

In many cases, the other agent's name and contact information is placed above the listing agent's, even though the listing agent knows far more about the property. Unsuspecting consumers often contact the agent whose name is displayed first, under the impression that they are the listing agent.

Nestfully, on the other hand, will operate under the agent-friendly philosophy of, "It's your listing; it's your lead." As such, it will adhere to fair display guidelines, posting only the listing agent's name and contact information above all others.

Another aspect of the new portal that should help it gain traction is that the leads it generates will be provided to agents at no extra cost, "saving them millions" in referral fees they now pay Zillow, Realtor.com and others, per the company. Some agents reportedly pay as much as 40% of their commissions to these sites.

One way or another, that cost is almost always shifted to the seller. Perhaps the listing agent won't work as hard to market the property as they otherwise would, for example, or maybe they will refuse to negotiate a lower commission.

Aggregators charge agents and brokers all sorts of fees. And to maintain profitability in the face of a slower housing market, "they are getting more and more greedy," says industry consultant Marilyn Wilson. "There's always some angle, and the consumer always ends up paying for it."

Especially troublesome to the real estate community is a referral fee that aggregators charge if someone buys a house they found on their sites. According to a study by the WAV Group, where Wilson is a managing partner, consumers are largely unaware of referral dollars taken by third-party portals.

"There is little, if any, consumer transparency that initial connections with 'agents' are often not with the listing agent, the one with the most listing information," WAV Group's research found. "Instead, it is an inside salesperson from a third-party portal or an agent paying a large percentage of their commission to a referring company."

In contrast, Nestfully vows that leads will be provided to brokerages at no cost.

Nestfully is a collaboration between three of the country's largest and most influential multiple listing services: the California Regional MLS, REcolorado and Bright MLS. Together, these three have some 240,000 agents and cover parts (or all) of eight states and the District of Columbia. Last year, their collective agent and broker subscribers had annual sales of more than $280 billion.

An unnamed "dozen or so" other multiple listing services -- of the 600-plus throughout the country -- have expressed interest in joining Nestfully, according to a Bright MLS spokesperson.

For Nestfully to succeed, though, it must capture the attention of homebuyers who have grown accustomed to pulling up Zillow and Realtor.com to look for houses. Previous attempts by others have not fared well.

One, Homesnap, was purchased by CoStar, a commercial real estate site. CoStar now also owns Homes.com and is in talks to purchase Move Inc., the Murdoch media company that owns Realtor.com. CoStar is said to have big plans for the residential market, but has yet to make a big splash.

Getting in front of consumers could be a tall, expensive order for Nestfully, and it could take years to change the habits of either consumers or realty pros. After all, Zillow and Realtor.com, which is the official listing site of the National Association of Realtors, didn't become the behemoths they are overnight.

Officials from the three collaborating MLSs are not ready to discuss the pending rollout of Nestfully or their marketing plans going forward. But a Bright MLS spokesperson believes the portal will have plenty of lift.

"We understand the importance of gaining consumer mindshare and we will drive our marketing efforts accordingly," she said in an email. "We also have the advantage of our member agents recommending Nestfully to their clients."

Too many homebuyers don't hunt for the lowest mortgage rate. They spend weeks, sometimes months, looking for a house. But when it comes to shopping around for a loan, they don't bother.

More than a third of all borrowers -- both first-timers and repeat buyers -- don't look beyond the first lender they consult, according to a recent survey by Fannie Mae. They either feel most comfortable with that lender or they are satisfied with that lender's quote.

That's too bad, because they might have saved some serious money had they shopped around.

LendingTree, the lender-matching service, says borrowers who search for the best rate and terms save an average of $63,151 over the life of a 30-year loan. That savings works out to $175 a month. Even if you don't actually hold the loan for 30 years, which most people don't, you'd save $21,000 over a decade.

LendingTree's research also finds that 56% of all borrowers accept the first offer they receive from a lender, and of those, 48% believe they received the best rate available. At the same time, of those who did compare rates, 46% said the first quote they received was not the lowest.

But the mortgage is only the half of it. Other Fannie Mae research shows that the mortgage payment only represents about 50% of homeowners' monthly housing costs. Costs like utilities, property taxes, insurance, maintenance and improvement expenses collectively account for the other half.

To get precise, the loan itself is about 30% of your monthly payment, Fannie Mae found, with the other 20% relating to transaction fees paid at closing. Those are largely made up of commissions, but also include loan origination fees, appraisals, credit reports, title reports, title insurance, settlement charges and local transaction taxes and recordation fees.

For what it's worth, many transaction fees are negotiable. Savings are available if you are willing to do the legwork.

But what about those ongoing costs? The typical owner spends $15,405 a year on them, Clever Real Estate reported about a year ago -- and undoubtedly, these costs have gone up since the study was released.

An update is due out in a month or so, but for now, let's break down Clever's most recent findings:

-- Property taxes. These are the main source of revenue for most jurisdictions. What you pay depends on the value of your house and where you live. They run from a high of $8,432 in New Jersey to a low of $609 in Alabama. The average nationally is $2,578, or almost $215 a month.

-- Utilities. This is the biggest subcategory of an owner's monthly outlay, adding up to $4,829 a year. That's much more than renters, largely because some landlords cover at least some of their occupants' utilities. Another reason: Houses tend to be larger than apartments, so they are more expensive to heat, cool and energize.

Monthly, the average cost of utilities is $402 a month.

-- Maintenance. This broad category covers almost everything: from painting to plumbing, electrical work to appliance repair. And some repairs, like replacing a roof or addressing structural deficiencies, cost far more than changing out a water heater.

Overall, the average spent on maintenance and repairs is $3,018, Clever found. But probably 33% of the respondents paid more than that -- $5,000 or more.

There are also recurring maintenance services to consider. Many owners do their own cleaning and mowing, but 4 out of 5 hire help for at least some ongoing services. The most common are pest control, landscaping, housekeeping and tree trimming.

Another aspect of this is time. Only you know what your time is worth, but on average, owners spend 230 hours a year taking care of their homes. That's about 19 hours a month -- almost a full day.

-- Insurance. Every lender requires borrowers to carry homeowner's insurance, and some even demand they take out another policy to cover floods. Even if you aren't compelled to carry both, you should. Clever says the average is $1,680 annually for an owner's policy, or $140 a month. That's a small price to pay to protect what's likely your greatest asset. Flood insurance is extra, but also worth the cost.

If you put down less than 20% of the purchase price, you'll also have to pay for mortgage insurance to protect the lender in case you default.

-- Association fees. Nearly 80% of the new houses built in 2021 were in communities run by the homeowners who live there. If you live in a place governed by an association, you'll pay a membership fee that covers the cost of maintaining amenities, streets, landscaping and other public features. Depending on the facilities -- golf, pools, tennis courts -- the cost is up there.

-- Improvements. Not everyone takes on a remodel or an addition, but those who do tend to spend big. Clever found that 35% spend more than $5,000 a year on flooring, windows and other alterations.

-- Emergencies. Everyone, homeowner or not, should have something tucked away for a rainy day. Unfortunately, more than half of the owners queried would have to borrow money to cover a $5,000 emergency. About a third of those would have to use a credit card.

About 20% of those surveyed had put away $1,000 or less in an emergency fund. But 43% had enough on hand to cover a $5,000 calamity.

Many of the nation's largest real estate firms still do not publish the share of the commission paid to agents who work with homebuyers, leaving buyers to fend for themselves.

Buyers can sometimes get a better deal when they know in advance what their so-called buy-side agents are being paid, says Stephen Brobeck of the Consumer Federation of America. If you know your agent's cut, it's possible to bargain for a lower rate or even ask for a rebate at closing. But if you have no clue what they're being paid, you are going into the transaction with blinders on.

Perhaps more importantly, if you understand who gets what, you can avoid being shown only the houses with the highest commission rates.

"Steering is the real problem," Brobeck told me. "'Steered' consumers may not be shown homes they would have preferred and end up paying higher commissions that are effectively added to the sale price of homes."

In a typical real estate transaction, the commission is split 50-50 between the brokerage firms where the listing agent and the selling agent work. Then, each brokerage pays a share of its take to their respective agents.

Most sellers know what their costs will be. But buyers rarely, if ever, ask -- even though it's their money that is disbursed at closing. It's their money because the commission is paid as a percentage of the purchase price, which the buyer pays.

Another reason you should know what your agent takes from the sale: Your agent should be working for you. If they do not have your best interests at heart, maybe they shouldn't be paid as much as someone who does.

In late 2021, the nation's 600 or so multiple listing services were required by the National Association of Realtors to allow MLS participants to publish the compensation offered to buyer's agents on all home listings.

The new rule was, in part, a response to criticism that by not publishing commission splits, agents were given a green light to steer buyers away from low-commission properties in favor of high-commission ones. Not all agents engage in this unethical practice, but enough do that it is a problem -- one recognized by the Federal Trade Commission as far back as 1983.

In his latest report, Brobeck says that even though some firms and listing-aggregate portals now allow splits to be published, few brokerages do so. Only Redfin "predominately publishes" buy-side rates on the houses carried on its site, Brobeck's research found. Redfin, for what it's worth, is primarily a discount broker.

Zillow, Keller Williams and Better Homes and Gardens show rates for only about half the houses on their sites, largely because local MLSs don't publish them, according to the report. And major firms like Century 21, Berkshire Hathaway, Sotheby's, Compass, Howard Hanna, Long and Foster, Crye-Leike and Realty One rarely, if ever, note buy-side commission rates.

Unfortunately, knowing what your agent earns for helping you find a house and making sure the sale goes through isn't likely to increase price competition, Brobeck explains, because splits are coupled together in one rate. He has been a major advocate for the uncoupling of commission rates.

Buyers should have the same ability to negotiate commissions with their own agents that sellers have with theirs, Brobeck says. "Untying commissions would allow buyers to negotiate rates, encourage sellers to do the same and provide new opportunities for discount brokers to market their services."

Two major lawsuits against the NAR are challenging the practice of tying rates together. Until that decoupling occurs, if it ever does, homebuyers should always look at the listing to find what share of the sales commission their agents are earning. If you can't find that percentage, ask your agent -- and don't settle for "half" as an answer. Half of what?

If your agent still balks, you can "almost always" find what you need to know on Redfin's property listings, says Brobeck.

Armed with that information, you can check to see if your agent discourages you from visiting properties where their cut is smaller. And if the percentage seems high, you can inquire whether a portion of it can be rebated to you. (Note: Nine states still outlaw such rebates.)

If buyer's agent rates were easily available to homebuyers, the CFA report says, "buyers might wonder or even question agents' reluctance to show buyers low-commission properties. Moreover, informed buyers could insist that these properties be shown."

The key message is this, says Brobeck: "Learn the commission rate offered to agents on any property of great interest to you. And talk to your agent about the possibility of a partial rebate of this commission to you."