Let's be candid about one thing. IDX was the solution every realtor needed about 10 years ago. Sure, it was better than all the hands-on work that was done to compile and display local MLS data, but as technology advances there comes a time to say goodbye to the old and in with the new. Enter RETS.
Sure, we at ZakGraphix are thrilled at using a language that is a million times more developer friendly and flexible, but that is not the primary reason we recommend its investment. Ownership is the first and foremost reason. Why pay $40 to $50 dollars a month for a service that should only cost you the price of hosting and bandwidth? GoDaddy offers virtual dedicated servers for as little as $27 dollars a month, and when implemented, a correctly written RETS script will run perfectly - updating their MLS listings and giving their website the exact same functionality that the larger guys offer, at half the cost.
We've recently started working on a new product called ZGrets. It will be an open source project available via our website for download. Excited? The plans are to create a version for standard PHP websites, and for WordPress as a plugin. As soon as the beta is available for testing, we'll have it available via our downloads section (Coming Soon!).
ZakGraphix - "Raising the Standard of Design, One Website at a Time."
Micah Zak
St. Louis Web Design - ZakGraphix.com