Photo privacy has become a hot topic in the real estate industry, and Flexmls has recently made enhancements to tackle it head-on. SWMLS and Flexmls are excited to introduce a new option to mark photos, videos, and virtual tours as private in Flexmls.     

Availability
This new feature became available on April 30, 2020.

Who Will Benefit
Everyone: You, your MLS, and your Homeowners!

For Agents
You will no longer need to delete photos, videos, and virtual tours to prevent them from being seen by the public. You’ll be able to mark photos as private to remove them from public view while retaining value for other members as they use listing photos to build CMAs or conduct appraisals.

For Homeowners
Your homeowners will no longer have privacy concerns about photos of their home on the internet.

How it Works
You can now mark photos, videos, and virtual tours on your listing as private, which means that they’ll be viewable by MLS members only. They will not be available to the public via the consumer portal, subscription emails, or shared links. The primary photo on a listing must still remain as public.

Marking a Photo, Video, or Virtual Tour as Private
All photos, videos, and virtual tours will be public by default. However, any Subscriber with permission to edit a listing can change the privacy setting for any media on that listing. 

When editing the photos for a listing, a new, red Mark Private button will be available. To mark a photo as private, simply select the photos you want to make private and then click on the Mark Private button. Important Note: Primary photos cannot be made private.

Photos that have been marked Private will appear with a red outline and the label PRIVATE. Select photos and click Unmark Private to remove the Private designation.

A similar Private button will also be available on the Videos page and Virtual Tours page for a listing.

Viewing a Private Photo, Video, or Virtual Tour
When a photo, video or virtual tour has been marked private, a Private tag will be displayed when members view the media in search results. In addition, private photos will be displayed only on the private version of listing reports.

In Flexmls Pro for iOS/Android/Mobile Web, private media will also display a Private tag. Private media will not be available via the consumer portal or app.