Can someone get me a map, so I can get out of here?

You crack me up! I just don’t want it to CHANGE the order that I give it. When the program determines and CHANGES the order, rather than simply following the houses in the order I input them, it is not useful.

You are right, the software doesn’t know which house is “better” than the next house, but it does tell you the “best route” depending on the LOCATION of the home and how to get to the next LOCATION of the next CLOSEST home. That’s what it’s meant for.

I’m not sure if this particular software allows you to rearrange the order to fit how you need it to. You would prob have to have some sort of software that allowed you to rate the “condition” of the home some sort of way and then still allow you to map it out that way from worst to best or vise versa depending on how you rated the condidtion of the home…..Someone out there I’m sure could figure out how to do that!

You lose me at “the program optimizes the BEST ROUTE. The program cannot have a mind of it’s own as BEST ROUTE is not about driving efficiency.

The Agent must determine BEST ROUTE and the program must follow the order of homes as given. I may be ordering 10 homes, from best to worst. Often the buyer stops me at 6 and says I want to buy number 2, once they realize they are down to the houses that decrease in desirability. They may not want to see the worst 4.

If the program re-orders my sequence, it wastes the buyer’s time.

Likewise, I may be showing in worst first order to explain why I recommend house #6. By seeing property in an increasingly desirable fashion, the buyer quickly sees why I am recommending house #6 without having to “take my work for it”.

Order of showings is sometimes, not always, very important. So any program that thinks “driving efficiency” is a pre-requisite is not useful to me.

I am not in the business of driving to and from houses in random order. But a taxi drive might like it!

The link that I mentioned for http://www.maps.com does most of what you stated above. You are able to type in up to 18 (I think) addresses. You have a couple of options. You can type in all the addrsses and it shows a map with all of the addresses and where they are at. It also lets you type in all the addresses and it optimizes the best route and tells you how to get from one to the next to the next to the next and so on. I have used this a few times when showing a lot of properties in areas I am not familiar with and was very happy with it.

The only bad things is it doesn’t show you one large map with the whole route layed out like you want, but I think it works pretty good the way they have it set up.

Nevertheless, it has saved me hours of trying to figure out which house to start at and then which one to go to next in areas I am not familiar with. It used to take me a few hours doing this in Mapquest. When I tried Maps.com…..it took me less than 30 minutes to map out 15 properties and print out all the directions.

I’ve had some interesting private emails on this post from “Super-Geeks!” who would love to write a program like this to sell to agents around the Country. They are asking me what the top 5 features might be, that the program would need to have, and I ask agents to reply here at this comment thread.

1) Ability to input not less than 6 and not more than 15 addresses. 10 is probably more than sufficient for most purposes. 5 would not be sufficient for most agents

2) If the actual mls system were modified to include this feature, a little thumbnail photo of each would be helpful on the final report.

3) PRIMARY requirement would be that the program NOT have a mind of its own and rearrage the properties in EFFiciency order. It is not always efficient to get there efficiently It is efficient to show them in an information building sequence, so the buyer has a good and orderly basis for comparison.

4) The program must give directions (no freeways!) on regular streets from house 1 to house 2 then house 2 to house 3, etc. Buyers need to see the condition of neighborhoods en route, so getting on a freeway is NOT a good idea.

Getting TO the first house doesn’t need to be there at all as there are many resources for that function. It’s getting from and to each houe in the string that is important. Should say:

Make left out of driveway of house 1, continue north on 178th to right on 5th which turns into 172nd then left on 6th to house on right
That may be too hard…but that would be ideal.

For those outside of the Seattle Area, yes…we have LOTS of numbered streets here…way too many, and you can be on 5th and end up on 178th without making a turn. You can also be at the corner of 4th and 4th…odd, but true. Now you know why we need this program

Update:

1) The Beta Mapping Platform from Yahoo didn’t work at all since it refused to recognize the addresses that were subsequently recognized by mapquest.

2) Robert’s suggestion regarding exporting and spreadsheets is not an easy enough solution for my everyday needs IMHO

3) I will try both Microsoft Streets and Trips and the $6.95 test version of maps.com and report my findings.

On another note, I sorely need to break down and upgrade my cell phone. Another further suggestions or comments to Robert’s recommendation of the Microsoft Smart Phone?? I have 3 users on my plan, and will have to switch out everyone’s phone since they are all AT&T vs. Cingular and one of us can’t go to Cingular without the other two trashing their phones as well, which has kept me from upgrading. Maybe a whole different carrier is in order at this point. Recommendations and thoughts appreciated.