Colorado real estate brokerage Metro Brokers announced it’s new map-based search engine at Inman Connect. From the Denver Post:
Starting today, consumers will be able to go online to find all homes on the market in Colorado.
Denver-based Metro Brokers Inc. is launching ColoradoHomeStop.com at the Inman Real Estate Connect conference in New York.
The company spent two years and more than $2 million to develop the site, which ultimately will incorporate the state’s 22 multiple listing services into one site, said Mark Eibner, chairman of Metro Brokers’ information technology committee. The initiative was paid for by the organization’s 2,000 members.
The advertising-free site takes the map-based real estate search to a new level of interactivity, building proprietary AJAX technology onto the Google Maps mapping platform.
Metro Brokers partnered with WhereToLive.com to integrate the company’s real-time SmartMap search technology into the website.
Among the features it offers are:
Street-level, aerial satellite and hybrid views of the property;
A photo tour of each property;
Neighborhood and school information specific to a property;
A map of each property and driving directions.
Users also can print property brochures, request additional information, schedule showings via the web and compare up to four properties side-by-side.
Metro Brokers has purchased the ColoradoHomeStop domain name in all 50 states in anticipation of launching the site – and the real estate company – nationally.
My take? Highly detailed. Kinda slow. The initial view if you don’t specify a search is every listed home in Colorado, so that’s gotta grind some gears. But zooming in takes a while per double-click, with more waiting for the map to re-render. The site makes very intelligent use of Ajax tabs to cram a lot of detail into one browser window.
(Hat tip: Dave Barnes)
Technorati Tags: Inman, Inman Connect, RE Connect, RE Connect NYC, real estate, real estate marketing
Curtis Lawson says:
Our Houston MLS has had this feature for a while now. They are reportedly working on making it a free tool to integrate into broker’s own sites.
Check it out:
http://har.com/MapSearch/default.cfm
January 8, 2007 — 9:28 pm
Spencer Barron says:
It’s got that zillow-like buzz but just doesn’t have any staying power. This has got to be the clunkiest search I’ve seen. I was bored in under five minutes…but it was quite visual. Its just not the special. I think they need a search tool that has a “if you liked that, you’ll like this feature.” Now that would be cool. I doubt they’ll be able to acheive their goal of “all” 22 systems being incorporated. Do you know how hard it is to get access to the Vail MLS? Or even the one step easier Summit County MLS. They just don’t make it that easy. Even if this was unique in some way, they’ll be ten high quality knock-offs before the end of the year.
(yawn)
January 8, 2007 — 11:32 pm
Drew Nichols says:
Coming from a technology background – specifically Web based, I’m really surprised that this cost $2mil to develop. I feel like it could have been done for much less.
Anyway, I don’t see this being a huge benefit to consumers. This site’s usability is low and “wow factor” medium.
January 9, 2007 — 6:56 am
philleto says:
I agree with Drew. I guess $2 Million doesn’t get you much these days. The competition in the real estate website world is rather fierce and this site doesn’t seem to be any different than the products that are already out there. I’d like to see integration of web 2.0 other than rss feeds.
January 9, 2007 — 11:49 am
Galen says:
Drew, I feel like it could have been done for less too. The little dots are kind of neat, but why can’t you click on them?
Really, why are almost all real estate search sites so useless when you’re zoomed out?
January 9, 2007 — 4:50 pm
Mark Eibner says:
Greg- Thanks for the post on http://www.ColoradoHomeStop.com The Denver Post article, misquoted me. I had stated that development costs and future hosting as well as further enhancements amounted to multiple millions. How that got boiled down to it cost 2M??? Anyway, the bulk of some of the development costs stem from the integration, augmentation and rules of compliance of multitudes of MLS’s IDX display rules. It’s out of control! To add to the complexity of the site, Metro Brokers, Inc. has over 800 companies…within one organization.
January 13, 2007 — 3:32 pm