Rain City Guide

Does Zillow’s Game Plan Includes Blogging?

Dustin on 02 7, 2006

You bet it does!

I just noticed that I’ve started to get hits from website with the URL: www.zillowblog.com… (Don’t expect much from the link as the site is password protected at the moment.) IT’S LIVE!

A little research into the URL suggests that the site is owned by Zillow as one would expect.

I don’t think the idea of a zillow blog will shock anyone, but it may help one of those people who are attempting to put together the Zillow puzzle.

And while I’m up to Zillow updates, the latest press release from Property Shark mentions Zillow 4 times!

New York City, February 7, 2006 – PropertyShark.com announces its home sale-price maps to empower appraisers and real estate professionals to effectively serve home buyers and sellers.

Launched as a beta, an example of this map for New York City can be seen here: http://www.propertyshark.com/maps/sales/

“We’ve decided to launch this on the eve of the launch of residential home valuation tool Zillow because, in my opinion, computer-based automated valuations, such as those you will likely see at Zillow, are more likely to be wrong than right. Every property is an illiquid, unique asset, and a computer program cannot accurately predict the price it will fetch on the market,” commented PropertyShark.com founder, Matthew Haines.

PropertyShark.com, which is designed primarily for use by appraisers and real estate professionals, provides users with the original data directly from government records, including sales price, mortgage amounts, document images, and ownership records.

“My understanding is that Zillow is out to disintermediate the broker and real estate salesperson, attempting to devalue the broker’s Comparable Market Analysis by providing an instant valuation of sorts. Unlike Zillow, PropertyShark.com is focused on empowering real estate professionals, not disempowering them. We give professionals, and savvy consumers, the actual raw data, as well as an unprecedented level of depth which captures the unique nature of each piece of real estate and its value,” expanded PropertyShark.com chief executive officer, Ryan Slack.

I wonder if the people at Zillow feel extra pressure because of all the expectations?

UPDATE:
Here are the Seattle property maps from PropertyShark. Select “Residential Sales/Sq ft (2004)” from their pull down menu to see an interesting map of all the property sales in the region color coded by the price per square foot of the sale. Interesting stuff…

About the Author: Dustin Luther

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As the founder of Seattle's Rain City Real Estate Guide, I love to talk, discuss and implement social media strategies that drives business in real estate. In following this passion, I founded 4realz.net Social Media Strategy and regularly speak about social media strategy to real estate audiences. You can connect with me on LinkedIn, become a fan on Facebook and follow me on twitter at @tyr.