Ranking the real estate search websites
No, the paper didn't actually rank them, I'm asking you to do that. What the paper did is test-drive some of the most popular websites for real estate searches. You can read that article here, or view each of the websites in screen-grab form here. I'll list the sites below, for your convenience, but the real purpose of this is to ask you: Which ones do you like, and why? Feel free to suggest sites that are not on the list below.
Real estate search websites:
Coldwellbanker.com
Homescape@latimes.com
Homegain.com
RealEstate.aol.com
RealEstate.msn.com
RealEstate.Yahoo.com
Realtor.com
Redfin.com
Remax.com
Trulia.com
Zillow.com
ZipRealty.com
Your thoughts? Comments? E-mail story tips to peter.viles@latimes.com
Photo credit: Los Angeles Times screen grab of www.trulia.com
Freedom CM, you have a point about us feeding you data :).
Posted by: sfvrealestate | July 22, 2008 at 11:47 AM
Why was the author willing to register with Homegain.com but not ziprealty.com? The complaint with ziprealty was that one did not get much information without registering. However, one get's no information from homegain.com without registering. This double standard really detracts from the credibility of the entire article.
Posted by: Pat | July 23, 2008 at 08:04 AM
Anyone ever tried Cyberhomes.com? Many of these sites are useful, but few have all the information in one place. Cyberhomes.com is owned by Fidelity National Financial (which houses the title agency and is the largest provider of MLS services) so we fundamentally have more content from within the FNF family of companies from which to aggregate our data. The site has more than 100 million records and adds 575,000 new ownership records every month, verified from the original source.
@ It All Happens on the Margin: With all the information on Cyberhomes, you are able to get what you need in one site (school info, economic stats, neighborhood analysis, etc.). Our average visitor stays on the site for more than 30 minutes!
@ jelah Cyberhomes has an option for searching for multi-family properties. You can add it into your search or just search for these exclusively.
Redfin is nice if you live in the cities that it covers. I know that they are expanding, but for now it is useless to me.
Just take a look around the site. You won't be disappointed.
Posted by: Brett | July 23, 2008 at 08:51 AM
Real Estate Search Engines are now world wide spread: Asia was missing on the list ... Now its done! Most important news being that Content Management System Joomla.org has been used. The Vietnam based www.bactamtam.vn offers a new approach: It embeds GIS (Mapping system) using google Sat as a layer and local maps to mashup informations such as simple weather up to flooding (Important in the mekong delta) As for its famous zillow & Trulia similar approach Bactamtam has something more to offer: The possibility to replicate the system for any region or country in a matter of hours!!!
Crisis time periods need to have access to informations as fast as possible : Let's bet that bactamtam shall invite those who have a good knowledge of the market to join: Interrested ?
Posted by: Frederic | October 16, 2008 at 12:11 AM