The days are long gone when you can just put up a sign and wait for phone calls to sell or find tenants for commercial property. This article dives into the top commercial databases in Louisiana and Mississippi to expose strengths and weaknesses in using technology to get commercial sold or leased. The top commercial databases are LACDB, MSCREX, Loopnet and CREXI which are utilized by commercial agents to find tenants, sellers and buyers, but we've discovered that the database with the most listings is not the one that works best. Let's get started.
The pie chart above shows the 6 common ways, called marketing channels, that agents can sell or lease commercial property, and the highest estimate is that 55% of prospects are found using commercial databases. In Louisiana there are 3 commercial databases, each having its own reach and costs ranging from $1,000 to $30,000 annually. Here is a deep dive into each database and its strengths.
The Louisiana Commercial Database (LACDB.com) reaches 1,500 commercial agent members in Louisiana who post 8,539 listings, with 4,007 properties for sale and 4,532 for lease. The database also has 314 commercial listings in Mississippi, with 187 for sale and 127 for lease. There are free email blasts to promote properties to agents, limited to one daily but unlimited blasts to clients. LACDB uses Catylist as their software provider plus you have access to a national database called Commercial Exchange which gives you wider distribution. Costs for subscribing to the database are $720 annually and agents can add SiteLink to have their listings automatically populate their website for an additional $800 annually. Agents do not have to be a member of the National Association of Realtors before they can subscribe to the database which reaches mostly Louisiana and Mississippi agents and brokers because subscriptions are the least expensive. LACDB offers market statistics showing the average sale or lease price and days on the market in each of the major categories: office, industrial, retail, shopping centers, hospitality and multi-family.
Mississippi Commercial Real Estate Exchange has 106 members who are commercial real estate agents and brokers, with 1,284 listings divided into 680 for sale and 604 for lease. The cost is $720 annually, up from $600, to subscribe to the database which allows you to post listings but it is owned by the Mississippi Association of Realtors, so membership in the National Association of Realtors and Mississippi Association of Realtors is required, increasing the cost an additional $454 annually. MSCREX uses the Commercial Exchange platform which is owned by Moody's, so listings here get regional exposure for tenants and buyers seeking property, but listings only get in front of 106 members in Mississippi.
Loopnet.com has 1,100,000 properties listed by 300,000 commercial agents nationwide. The marketplace gets 11,000,000 unique visitors monthly. For its massive size, Loopnet.com only has 656 listings for sale and 368 for lease in Louisiana, and in Mississippi has 788 for lease and 726 for lease.
This database brings in tenants and investors both locally and nationwide because Loopnet was purchased by CoStar recently, giving it national exposure; however, not everyone can see a listing on Loopnet. Agents can post listings without paying to be a Loopnet subscriber, but those listings are marked as Basic which are not shown to anyone except paid CoStar subscribers and very few agents subscribe to CoStar because they require everyone licensed under a Broker name to pay. It gets very expensive and just not feasible for most listings.
Loopnet offers 4 platforms: Basic (free), Silver ($5,000 annually for 4 listings and 10 listings for $8,400 annually), Gold ($8,400 annually for 4 listings), Platinum ($14,000 annually for 4 listings) and Diamond ($30,000 annually for 7 listings). The Diamond level offers:
CREXI.com has 1 million commercial real estate agent subscribers but an average 2 million buyers, brokers, and tenants each month exploring over $2 trillion of property value nationwide. Crexi has 2,367 properties in Mississippi for sale and 1,212 for lease, and 2,771 for sale in Louisiana and 3,587 for sale. Crexi Pro cost $4,800 annually for unlimited listings.
In utilizing a database to reach tenants and commercial agents directly, not all databases are the same. Most local agents who can bring tenants and buyers to a listing subscribe to LACDB.com since it is the most affordable. LACDB only reaches 1,500 agents so, in the chart above, their agent count column is barely visible when compared to the other databases; however, those are the local agents who often have qualified tenants and buyers as their clients and are seriously looking for property in Louisiana and Mississippi.
CREXI is a fairly new database but already has almost as many Louisiana and Mississippi listings as LACDB plus provides a national reach with 1,000,000 agents and investors as subscribers. Loopnet recently merged with CoStar and anything other than a Basic listing gets Louisiana and Mississippi property in front of prospective tenants and buyers nationally. If your property is above average in size, you may not find tenants or buyers easily because the Louisiana/Mississippi economy no longer drives large companies to the area. If you need to reach larger markets such as Houston, Dallas, Nashville or Miami, the Crexi database is for you.
For more information on managing commercial property, read our article 3 Common Mistakes In Every Lease
