I am wondering if any agents that use MRED (MLS system used by Chicagoland Realtors) have found a way to set up searches for absentee owners, or if any of other services provided through our membership are capable of running absentee searches.

@Elias Betondo I don't know of any way to use the MLS to automatically check for absentee owners. You can do it manually using Realist but you'll have to enter addresses individually. Not very efficient. Much more efficient to use List source.

Thank you @Crystal Smith .  I've used the manual method through Realist, but as you mentioned it is very time consuming.  I'm going to give List Source a try.

I am a realtor and use the MLS everyday.
That is not a function it can do.

As mentioned list Serv or yellow letters would be ideal.

You can do it through Realist.  Call MRED help desk and they will walk you through it.  I've done it and found it sorted quite well if you hit the right parameters.  

You can also use ListAbility.com to find absentee owners.

Thank you for all the responses everyone!

I'm going to look into all the services: Listsource, Listability, & Listserv.  @John Weidner I will also call the help desk to try it out.

I would like to log in to Realist outside of the MLS...

Does anybody know what the MLS group is for Chicago area?...