IDXCentral.com Offers Foreclosure Searches
June 2, 2009 by Mark
For anyone who was not already aware, many of the MLS’s we get data from now offer Foreclosure and Short Sale data in their IDX feeds. As a result we have added the ability for visitors to your website to search for property based on this new criteria. If this criteria has been added to your IDX solution you will see the new search options on your Search Properties form.
You may want to add a new link to your Navigation or promote the fact that visitors can now search for foreclosures on your website. Another strategy may be to add a page on your site specific to foreclosures and/or create a quick search form that will allow visitors to start searching from there (the latter will take some programming knowledge or you can hire us to help). Here are a couple examples: Coldwell Banker Grass Roots Realty and TopSpaces.com.
Many buyers and investors are looking to search for foreclosures and short sales due to their perception that these will offer them great deals. You may also want to look at anyone who has signed up for listing notifications of these types of properties and notify them of properties that are not necessarily foreclosures but simply well priced homes.
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!
Zillow iPhone App Creates Huge Exposure for Your Listings
May 13, 2009 by Mark
If you are not already putting your listings on Zillow, including updated photos, you are missing a huge opportunity to get some additional free exposure for your client’s home. Within just two weeks of launching, Zillow’s iPhone application has been downloaded more than 260,000 times.
Basically anyone who has downloaded this free application can pull up a map, based on where they are standing (or driving) and it will display the typical information that you find on Zillow. This includes homes for sale (as well as the usual Zestimates, sold history, etc). If someone is out and about and sees a house for sale, they can simply click the app and it will automatically determine where they are standing (using GPS) and let them know what the listing price is for any homes around them, provided the agent took the time to get that information on Zillow. You can even see additonal photos that have been uploaded.
I would imagine savvy home sellers will know of this application as well and expect you to be keeping their listing data updated in Zillow so they get this additional exposure. For more information about this new application visit the following pages.
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!
Zillow’s “Advice” Can Help Build Credibility
December 16, 2008 by Mark
On December 15th Zillow officially launched “Zillow Advice”. With so many people looking for answers regarding current market information and specific home questions, this can give agents an opportunity to respond to these questions and establish themselves as a local expert. For the complete article be sure to check out Zillow’s blog post: Advice — just when we need it the most. Zillow offered this advice in their article:
“For real estate professionals, Zillow Advice offers another free way to promote your services to local home buyers and sellers. If you read a few Discussions and Answer a few Questions you’ll get the hang of it quickly. My tip for real estate pro’s is to subscribe to e-mail or RSS alerts for topics and locations you specialize in. And be sure to fill out your profile page so people know how to reach you if they like your advice!”
Similarly, if you were not already aware, Trulia offers this service as well called “Trulia Voices.” If you have not done so already, we would strongly recommend establishing accounts with both of these services and responding to questions as often as possible. We would also recommed setting up a Google Analytics account (or similar stat tracking account) to determine how much traffic these sites are referring to you.
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!
