Is scraping MLS listings legal

Practically speaking, no. There is no Canadian statute titled “thou shalt not scrape,” but three overlapping legal layers make scraping MLS listings a liability rather than a shortcut: enforceable website terms of use, copyright in photos and descriptions, and — for anyone licensed — board rules that end careers faster than lawsuits do. We operate on the licensed side of this line, running board data feeds under signed agreements, so this is a first-hand map of where the line sits. (General information, not legal advice.)

Layer one: terms of use are contracts

Every portal and board site that displays listings publishes terms prohibiting automated collection, and Canadian courts have enforced them. The leading example is a 2011 B.C. Supreme Court decision in which a listings site scraped brokerage listing data and was found liable for breach of the website’s terms of use — browsing past a posted terms page was enough to bind the scraper — as well as for copyright infringement in the copied property descriptions and photos. The judgment ordered the copying stopped and awarded damages. Scraping cases turn on their facts, but the Canadian baseline the decision set is durable: “it was on the open web” is not a defence to a terms claim.

Layer two: someone owns every photo

Listing photos are copyrighted works, typically owned by the photographer or licensed narrowly to the listing brokerage for marketing that listing. Descriptions are authored text. A scraper republishing them acquires none of those rights, and photo copyright is the cleanest infringement claim in the scraping playbook because registration isn’t required and copying is self-evident. This is also why licensed feeds are strict about media: our agreements require serving images from our own infrastructure under the licence, never hot-linking a board’s servers — the rights chain is managed, not assumed.

Layer three: if you hold a licence, the rules reach you first

For a realtor, the scraping question is usually career math, not litigation math. Board membership agreements and MLS rules prohibit unauthorized data use, and a member commissioning a scraper is still the member on the hook. Boards audit websites, investigate data misuse, and can discipline, fine, or cut off access — consequences that arrive long before any courtroom. The often-cited Toronto Real Estate Board v. Commissioner of Competition case changed what boards must offer members through licensed VOW feeds; it did not loosen anyone’s right to scrape, and boards police their data at least as actively since.

The licensed routes exist, and they’re the point

Everything a scraper wants has a sanctioned channel: IDX feeds for active listings, VOW feeds for sold data behind a registration gate, and DDF for national syndication. The path for a TRREB member is documented in how to get TRREB listings on your website, and the economics — which are administrative rather than data-purchase costs — in what an MLS data feed costs. The licensed feed is updated continuously, includes media rights handled correctly, and survives an audit. The scrape breaks weekly, carries legal exposure, and can never be shown to a board with a straight face.

Where the line actually sits

Reading listings: obviously fine. Publishing your own analysis of market data through permitted channels has its own rules — see can I publish market statistics. Automated harvesting of listing data or media from sites whose terms prohibit it: a contract breach with copyright attached, and for licensees a board-rules violation stacked on top. If a vendor offers you a listings website powered by “aggregated” data with no board agreement for you to sign, that absence is the tell — the lawful supply chain always involves your signature.