A national multiple listing service run by the National Association of Realtors should be ready by late summer, the large trade association announced today.

NAR has been working for the last decade to put all of the nation’s agent-represented homes for sale into one database, consolidating the 800-plus multiple listing services in the U.S. in the process.

“Everybody has been on board with the national MLS idea for a long time and we’ve been working on it for the last decade,” the trade group said in a press release.

Brian Boero, co-founder of real estate marketing and design firm 1000watt, who predicted NAR’s national MLS move in one of his “Friday Flash” blog posts five years ago, said, “It’s a great move by NAR. I wonder what took them so long.” 

“It’s about damn time,” said Matt Cohen, chief technology officer of real estate consulting firm Clareity Consulting.

“In some cities there were five or more MLSs!” Cohen said. “How and why did that even happen?”