Tag Archives: Zillow

Using Alexa to Compare Traffic Across Sites

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Do you ever wonder how well your website and/or blog is doing in comparison to your competitors?

While there is not a great site on the web for getting accurate traffic statistics on competitors, Amazon does provides some stats based on people who are using their Alexa Toolbar. Rather than try to give total site hits (which they can’t do), Amazon gives us relative stats (as in “X number of people out of a million” visited this site). Here are some observations from some searches I did tonight:

All good stuff, but remember to take these statistics with a grain of salt. As Matt Cutts of Google discussed a while back, the type of people visiting a site can definitely skew these results greatly and considering Rain City Guide is in Amazon’s backyard, we’re more likely than most to have traffic from people with the Alexa toolbar installed.

Marketing my Home on the Internet

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While my opinion that a good real estate blogger does not include their listings on their blog is well documented and much debated, there is always room for an exception… and marketing my OWN home is one of those!

[photopress:kids_at_easter.JPG,thumb,alignright]Essentially, we have about two weeks left before we put it on the market. We’re just waiting for the movers to take our stuff and then, after we refinish the wooden floors on the main floor, we’ll be ready to list!

So, here are the internet marketing items I have on my checklist (of course, we’ll do some off-line stuff like putting together fliers, but I’m more interested in exploring the online stuff!)

  • Add Our Home to the Free Directories. Craigslist and Google Base come to mind. Are there others I should consider?
  • Blog About Our Neighbors. I know that there is very limited things that a real estate agent can say about the family-friendly nature of a neighborhood, but not having a license gives me the freedom to talk in great detail about are wonderful neighbors. Things I’d like to mention are all the kids that live nearby (8 kids within a few houses!), our regular Sunday BBQs during the summer and our weekly game nights during the Winter. (And I’m sure the neighbors would love it if the new owners continued our tradition of hosting the annual neighborhood easter egg hunt!!!). When moving to a new home, one of the biggest mysteries is what are the neighbors going to be like and because the people on our street are so cool, I’d like to put together an extensive neighborhood blog post! (Honestly, the hardest part of accepting a position in LA was leaving the neighborhood!)

    • [photopress:start_easter_hunt.JPG,thumb,alignright]

  • Financing Options. Interestingly, I’m in a place where I could offer the “right” people some innovative financing options… Like a lease-to-own, or something similar (as long as it is a win-win for both parties, I’m game for any idea!). Does something like this normally happen through the usual MLS channels or is there a special market for these types of properties? (Hint: if you contact me before we list, we might even be able to cut out some obvious fees.)
  • Blog About Our House. I promise not to overdo this, but I think one blog post about all the cool features of our home that might be too “personal” for the typical MLS listing would be appropriate on Rain City Guide. I’m thinking of things like the tree house I built in the backyard and the original art deco fixtures… I’d also like to add a map of all the recently sold homes (or maybe I’ll be lazy and just link to the appropriate ShackPrices page!)
  • Unique Icon. Robbie says he’ll give our home a unique icon on the maps of listed properties… Any ideas for what the icon should look like?
  • Enhance listing on Realtor.com. Around Move, people are shocked at how often real estate agents pay to get showcase listings and then don’t spruce up their listings by adding additional photos and other extras. Considering that Anna’s broker already pays for this service, I’ll make sure we spruce up our home!

    • [photopress:eggs.JPG,thumb,alignright]

  • Get on the Redfin Blog. If I provide a direct link from my blog to my listing on Redfin (and beg people to click on the link!) maybe I can blow out their single home stats for a day and thereby get a mention in their blog!!! (hmmm…. Is there a way to get on the Zillowblog?)
  • Newspaper Coverage? Is someone at the Seattle Times, Seattle PI, Seattle Magazine and/or any other local newspaper interested in writing a story about preparing and then selling a 1920’s Crown Hill (N. Ballard) home? We’ve got lots of great photos and I could probably write most of the story for you! 🙂
    (This reminds me… I did an interview for a real estate technology story that was suppose to be in the May issue of the Seattle Magazine. I never saw or heard anything about that story… Did this story ever go live? )
  • Picture Cloud. These guys just sent me a link for a free photo cloud. Interesting technology and easy enough to put together, so I think I’ll try them out with our home. (By the way, their branded option is free, but if you type the code “raincity”, they they will give you credit for five unbranded clouds for a penny.) If you try them out before I post my cloud, let me know what you think!

Any other ideas as I prepare the marketing plan for our home? Has anyone ever had any luck marketing a home on the internet? What did you do?

Day One – Realtor Mid-Year

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I just attended my first meeting at the NAR Mid-Year. It was the MLS Association Executives Committee Meeting. There were three presenters to the group and I will provide some highlights of their presentations.

Laurie Janik, NAR General Counsel

Laurie indicated that claims against MLS under the NAR EO Insurance Policy have for the first time surpassed the number of general association claims. Out of 32 claims made this year, 18 involve MLS issues. Of the 18, 8 involve the FTC, 7 the DOJ and one involves a state attorney general. Most of the claims revolve around whether an MLS can exclude Exclusive Agency listings from data feeds to third party websites (e.g. Realtor.com). Since Exclusive Agency listing allow the seller to sell the house themselves, MLSs argue that allowing these listings to be displayed on the Internet basically enables the seller to have free advertising to attract a buyer without paying the listing side of the commission.

Laurie also discussed the DOJ lawsuit. NAR filed a motion to dismiss which raised three arguments:

First, that the DOJ is seeking injunctive relief for the VOW policy that has been rescinded and never implemented and as a result, there is no relief that can be granted under this claim.

Second, that the VOW Opt Out provision is neutral on its face, there is a presumption of cooperation and that decisions to Opt-Out are based on independent action of each broker.

Third, that the DOJ’s claim against the current Internet Listings Display Policy does not allege any anti-competitive effect.

Laurie cautioned that Motions to Dismiss are rarely granted in the 7th Circuit (where the suit is pending). She also said that 14 MLSs have been involved in DOJ subpoenas and that the NAR insurance coverage for this claim is gone so the MLSs that are involved are now spending their own money to respond to the subpoenas.

Lastly, she indicated that there was a productive settlement conference. She believes a key issue in the case will revolve around the MLS definition of “Participant

Rich Barton of Zillow talks at Northwest Entrepreneur Network on Friday

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Just a quick note to let you know that Rich Barton of Zillow and Expedia will be talking at the Northwest Entrepreneur Network on Friday morning. Here’s the link for anyone who wants to check it out: http://www.nwen.org/calendar/regbreakfast.htm

Note that you have to get up before breakfast for these meetings 🙂

See you there.

What a week!

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[photopress:view_of_santa_monica.jpg,thumb,alignright]My family and I spent the past week scoping out appropriate neighborhoods in Ventura County! No matter where we choose to live in Southern California, it will definitely be a major change from our way of life in Seattle…

As I spent most of the week away from the internet (I did have a BlackBerry, but that doesn’t really count!), I’ve fallen way behind so I’m going to play a quick catch up here by mentioning a few of the things that have caught my eye this evening as I returned to the web:

  • Dan Green, ofThe Mortgage Reports Blog, let me know that Rain City Guide received at least one nomination for the Most Innovative Real Estate Blog. Very cool! Thank you Dan!
  • There has been some buzz around a new real estate blog featuring a large group of real estate professionals. I look forward to following the site…
  • I received emails from people at both Zillow and Move on how to better use their systems to find appropriate neighborhoods, so I’m going to have to revisit my post on the home buying process.
  • Ardell published a great article that has been very well received by other bloggers!
  • For the first time since the inception of RCG, I’ve not read EVERY single comment that has been posted on RCG! AHH!!! I’ve got some more reading to do! And on a very related note, my inbox is over-flowing with emails that are worth a quality response, so don’t be surprised if it is taking me a while to respond!

The Mind of a Home Buyer

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So, we’re moving to Southern California, and we have some obvious questions we want answered:

  • What neighborhoods should we be looking in?
  • What neighborhoods can we afford?

Here’s what we do know:

  • I’m going to work at location 30700 Russell Ranch Rd, Westlake Village, CA.
  • We can afford a home in the $500 to $600K range.
  • I’m willing to commute a fair distance (up to 40 minutes) if the home was a great deal, but I’d really rather be within bicycling distance to work.
  • The employees of Move that I talked with recommended Thousand Oaks (10 minutes), Santa Barbara (45 minutes) and Santa Monica (45 minutes).
  • If we can’t afford something in our price range that is acceptable, I’d consider renting a place, especially if it was close to the beach.

Anna and I spent some time on the internet playing around. We tried what I thought would be the most promising options: Realtor.com, Trulia and Zillow. I know that none of these sites is geared toward finding appropriate neighborhoods, but I thought I might be able to “trick” them into helping us out:

  • Realtor.com. I began by doing a search of [3 bedroom homes in Westlake Village, CA]… Surprise, surprise, the only home listed under $600K are mobile homes (and yes, there is a mobile home listed for $599K). I didn’t really expect to find a home in Westlake Village, but I was hoping that I might be able to do a large-area search using this tool, so that I might be able to get an idea where a concentration of appropriate homes are located, but there was no (obvious) way to widen my search using the available tools. Next I turned to their beta map search. This was more helpful in that it gave me homes nearby Westlake village, but it was not entirely clear to me how it determined it should widen my search. And scrolling around the map doesn’t refresh it with new properties as one would hope. Because we don’t even know the cities/zip codes we want to look in, I couldn’t keep Anna interested in searching around the beta site and we moved on after a few minutes.
  • Zillow was a bit better because I could zoom in and see a price next to each City’s name. Presumably, this is the average price for the City, but I’m not 100% sure of this. However, smaller cities (and/or huge neighborhoods in the case of Los Angeles) don’t show up. Until I zoomed into each individual property, there was not an easy way to tell if I could afford the area. Overall, we gave up on Zillow after a few minutes as I couldn’t “trick” it into telling me about appropriate neighborhoods.
  • Trulia was definitely the best of the three… I could give it a very detail search entry [3+ beds, $550K to 600K, Westlake Village], and then scroll around the map to see what neighborhoods might work for us. It also had the bonus of showing us “average home prices” depending on where you center the map. (i.e. if I’m over Thousand Oaks, I see the average 1, 2, 3 and 4+ bedroom price!).

Here is what I learned from Trulia from my search:

  • There’s no chance we’re going to buy a home along the coast of Santa Monica or Malibu (I didn’t really expect that this would be an option, but now it is confirmed).
  • If we want to buy a place within biking distance, we may be able to afford something in Thousand Oaks. My brief foray into Realtor.com hinted that a place in Thousand Oaks would likely be a townhome.
  • There are a lot more options either north (Simi Valley) or west (Camerillo, Oxnard, or Ventura), but the dream of owning in Santa Barbara is definitely out of the picture.
  • It looks like there might be something available for us in “the valley”, but both Anna and I want to go in the other direction if possible.

We’re thinking of making a trip to LA relatively soon to check out neighborhoods and tour some homes. Is it enough for us to check out the Ventura and the Simi Valley/Thousand Oaks area, or should we add a few different neighborhoods/cities to our radar?

Of course, the home search process definitely makes me wonder if the LA market has topped off and if it might make a whole lot more sense for us to rent (could we be near the beach?). If I do decide to look further into renting, I’ll definitely post an review of my online search.

Interesting side note: Despite my proclaimed confidence in “context” tools like blogging, I haven’t yet turned to blog posts and/or forums for any answers about neighborhoods (nor have I felt compelled to click on any ads).

If you thought “Zestimates” were off, try RealEstateABC.com’s Value Tools

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Announced with lots of fanfare on Inman today about New home-valuation site rivals Zillow. Just went to check it out and it valued my home at $618,000 compared to Zillow’s Zestimate of $1.12 Million. Hmm..just a slight margin of difference there. Inman’s blog site covers the ABC Value tool as “Zillow is old news“.

Personaly, while neither is quite accurate (I think Zesitmates have been covered enough already), I’ll take the old news over the new player on the block. They seem to miss some major value factors like..oh about 50ft of waterfront. All-in-all I think these services make interesting discussion points for our clients but it will be some time before they are on the money.

Robert

Why Google Base Matters

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If you are building a real estate search site and you didn’t hear the warning shot fired by Google today, then you don’t really deserve to be in business much longer. While just about anyone building a real estate search tool should be concerned, I’m going to focus this article on my friends over at Zillow…

Zillow: be worried… Be very worried.

Here’s some background… Yesterday I was playing around with some google searches when I noticed a new box that shows up when you do a real estate search… as in [Seattle+real+estate]:
[photopress:google_search_box.jpg,full,centered]

This takes you to a simple (and kind of ugly) results page:
[photopress:google_result_page.jpg,full,alignright]

Where you can also go to a simple (and not very user-friendly) map of listings:
[photopress:google_result_with_map.jpg,full,centered]

My impression of Google’s latest features is that the data is VERY incomplete and the interface is ugly.

So, why should the people behind Zillow be worried?

Three reasons:

  1. You are not sticky. I’m a hard-core real estate user and after satisfying my Day 1 voyeurism, I’ve never had a good reason to visit your site again. I’ve talked with your staff about this and I know that you are not geared toward a user like me, but I recommend you find a way to create stickiness if you really are planning to be an ad-based media company. Why? See reason #2…
  2. A super-sticky site only has to be half as good at proving a home valuation to decimate your business. People who start their home search on-line do not start a home search by typing in [www.zillow.com] or even [www.realtor.com]. People start a home search (and especially people moving to a new city) by typing a query into a google search box. From now on, those people are ALL going to see Google’s offerings, and should Google decide to add a valuation tool, the tool will likely be “good enough” so that they never even both going to Zillow. Google only has to be good enough at providing a valuation in order to capture most of your market. Why? See reason #3…
  3. People are lazy. People don’t use your site to get the “exact” price of their home since you don’t even try to provide it. If you asked 10 appraisers to value a typical Seattle home, you would get 10 different answers and at least a 5% standard deviation in their answers. Even if you can improve your answers by 2% more to match the variability inherent in the emotional decisions associated with buying a home, that is still not good enough. Don’t waste much more time trying to improve your appraisal methods. You’re good enough and soon others (like Google?!?) will have a service that is good enough as well. Instead, find something sticky. You have a very talented team, so I doubt you’re suffering from lack of ideas. Nonetheless, it is clearly time to develop something that will bring me back to your site on a regular basis.

To everyone else creating real estate search tools, I’m not convinced that a vertical real estate search will ever beat Google’s offerings UNLESS they have a much better database of homes than Google. Right now, Google is seriously lacking in quality inventory. However, if the consumers go there (and they will), then you can expect brokers (and someday brokerages!) to follow with their listings.

What do real estate industry people talk about?

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My 10-12 weeks of “blogging” have been quite interesting for me, in that for 15 years I mostly have talked about the real estate industry with other industry people, and talked about local real estate with my own clients and local agents. Blogging opens up talking to consumers generally about the industry, which is in and of itself, quite a revelation.

Given I will be attending the MIT dinner event tomorrow, I am contrasting the speakers of that event with the participant theories of my normal industry discussions. Tomorrow’s event will be “the newbies” Zillow and Redfin plus HouseValues, whom I wouldn’t call a “newbie”.

I am “lifting” this discussion of the past few days from the forum that has been around since 1995 or so, and I have participated in since 1998. I thought this particular discussion was a huge complement to whatever I may hear tomorrow night. For the benefit of those attending tomorrow night, you might want to read this beforehand for “balance”. I have removed the names, except mine, since I am “lifting” it out. I think at least Robbie’s interest will be peaked by that part of the discussion that suggests that the MLS may cease to exist as an end result to all of this.

*******************

Agent A says:

I would guess that there is not a large brokerage in the country that doesn’t have plans to withdraw from MLS depending on the outcome of the DOJ suit. I believe that many large brokers are considering withdrawing from MLS REGARDLESS of the outcome of the DOJ suit…

All across America, in every major city there are 3 or 4 large brokers who control around 80% of the inventory. If COURT mandated MLS rules don’t make competitive sense to those brokers MLS will END.

Even if you and Attorney Barry and the rest of the majority of the NAEBA are victorious your victory will be pyrrhic– MLS will be run YOUR way but it won’t contain enough listings to be a market force.

“Ardell” wrote:

What I am asking everyone one to focus in on is what “should be” as opposed to what “has been” since before buyer agency existed.

and

My major beef with the industry is that buyer agency was set into a system, parts of which should have been revised accordingly, and still need to be revised.

Agent B says…

Could it be that buyer agency will be given as the justification for the large brokers pulling out of the MLS? As Ardell notes, the whole system is a carry-over from a time before buyer agency. Does it really make sense to “cooperate” with other brokers in an adversarial relationship in the same way as when it was a subagency relationship?

One could argue that a listing agent is not truly acting in their seller’s best interest by making the property available to buyers working with their own agents until they have made every effort to find a buyer themselves. If a buyer agent is really going to save their buyer money, help them get more concessions, etc, isn’t it in the seller’s best interests for their agent to find an unrepresented buyer?

Consider this hypothetical situation:

Large brokerage with a state-of-the-art website and large advertising budget decides that they will take all of their listings as exclusive, non-MLS, non-cooperating listings for 45 days. No lockbox, the listing agency will conduct every showing, and there will be no showings to buyers who have not gotten a mortgage pre-approval. During this period, they will not do dual agency, and will attempt to find buyer customers for their listings. If they do not sell in 45 days, the listing will then be entered into the MLS. Their justification for this is that they believe that this maximizes the chances that the seller will get an offer that is in their best interests. Is there anything that would be illegal or unethical about this?

I think it is very easy to come up with scenarios in which the MLS becomes the dumping ground for the bottom of the barrel properties and over-priced dogs. It’s also easy to see scenarios in which MLS entries are very bare bones affairs with just enough info to generate a lead from Realtor.com, but not enough to be useful for other agents anymore. I find it very hard, though, to picture a scenario in which the large brokerages will just happily keep providing data-rich, picture-laden MLS entries for all of their listings, if they lose control over how and where these listings will be used and displayed.

I thought this might be food for thought for those who have not considered how the industry might change in order to counteract the events currently taking place with regard to mls access.

The Zillow Conspiracy

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Zillow seems to inspire one of three questions in people:

  1. How did Zillow do such a good job zestimating the value of my home?
  2. How did Zillow do such a bad job zestimating the value of my home?
  3. Did they really hire people to digitize that many public records?

The answer to these questions:

  1. They hired some darn smart people
  2. Apparently not smart enough
  3. A smell a conspiracy!

To understand how Zillow could possible get their hands on that many government records, it is important to understand that they must have had someone on the inside. I’ve suspected for a while that they had someone on the inside at one of the lesser government agencies, like the Department of Housing and Urban Development, but today I found proof that they have an insider at an even higher level of the government: The Treasury Department.

It seems that they’ve worked some type of advertising deal with the Treasury Department, and I’ve searched the web, but I think I’m going to be the one to break this story.

Zillow is now advertising on the one-dollar bill!

[photopress:zillow_dollar.jpg,full,centered]

Talk about prime real estate! Not even Microsoft has that kind of reach!

On a more serious note, if you were the Zillow employee who defaced the dollar bill and then used it to buy a lunch at Planet Java, you are welcome to contact me to reclaim the evidence of illegal activity (no questions asked!) before it falls into the wrong hands.