Seattle Housing Buzz

Nothing new this week, but I did post an article on pre-construction investing at the Seattle Condos and Lofts blog. Take a look at it and let me know what you think.

Vulcan and John L. Scott finally issued their official press release this week about John L. Scott handling sales for Vulcan’s current projects - Veer Lofts, Enso, The Martin and Rollin Street Flats. Not quite sure why it took so long considering it was included in the information packets Vulcan handed out at their preview event back on June 17th.

Coldwell Banker Bain introduced a near indentical search function as John L. Scott (same developer). One thing I like about theirs it that users can filter by # of cars and # of stories.

Been playing the points game at ActiveRain and I’ve fallen to third featured agent in Washington. Another JLS agent is listed as the #1 featured agent in Washington, mostly because of some fluffy blog postings.

This past weekend was the annual Seattle LGBT Pride Parade. For the first time in the event’s history, it was moved to downtown Seattle. The route on 4th Avenue went from the Westlake Center to the Seattle Center, passing right in front our office on 4th Avenue where we threw a party for clients and neighbors. An estimated 200,000 people lined the streets and attended the festival at the Seattle Center. This was also the first year that John L. Scott hosted a booth at the festival, joining Prudential, C21 & Wells Fargo.

Most of us know about Google. And, most of us who know about Google know about Google Labs. Some of the programs they’re working on are nifty such as Google Maps. But, most are gimmicky and aren’t really useful. To be fare, these are side projects for many of the developers who work on the programs on their spare time.

Zillow has now entered the playground with Zillow Labs. The Lab has three toys to play with - a Zillow Search button for the Google Toolbar, a search add-on for Firefox, and Zillow search box to plop into websites. I’m not so sure these are quite the “cutting-edge projects” that Zillow Labs say they are.

The first two, to me, fall into the gimmick category and just clutters the Google Toolbar and Firefox. I’m wondering who would actually use it and when. Sellers don’t sell homes regularly so I’m wondering if they would even install these programs. It’s not like their home’s value is going to change daily. Internet-savvy buyers would find more value in that they can look at what the Zestimates are for the properties they’re interested in. But once they make their purchase, I’m guessing many won’t uninstall it leaving another application cluttering their browser.

The third, well, I’m not sure who it’s intended for. As an agent, I wouldn’t incorporate it. Nevermind that Zestimates are often criticized, but why would I send my clients to Zillow? Besides, I think I can perform a much more thorough analysis. True, Zillow’s info is immediate, generally within range and people do need to wait for me to complete my analysis, but I tend to think my results are more credible and comes with a personal touch to boot.

Oops, I just tried it…

We could not find the home you requested. The map is showing the general area you requested.

For over a year I’ve been stopping by a website called Real Estate Webmasters. Primarily, Real Estate Webmasters (REW) is a website design and search engine optimization (SEO) firm out of Nanaimo, British Columbia. They design stunning websites; take a look at their design portfolio. They’re not cheap but compare their designs to the numerous agent sites and you can appreciate the quality of their work.

But, what has been invaluable for me is their active webmaster forum. Agents, website developers, SEO consultants and REW staff freely share their knowledge. I’ve learned a lot from the forum and gotten great advice to my website related questions.

If you’re an agent you really need to check them out.

Ok, perhaps a bit more subdued, but John L. Scott has been quietly adding more features on it’s website to empower sellers and buyers alike. Here’s a little break down.

Several months ago, utilizing Real Tech’s search technology, John L. Scott incorporated an interactive map search. This feature allowed buyers to zoom in to a specific area on a map of Washington, Idaho or Oregon. The map would identify all available homes on the map with a little house icon. Buyer’s could zoom into a specific area by using the cursor to draw a box around the area they’re interested in.

About a month ago, John L. Scott upped the ante by being among the first real estate companies to incorporate Microsoft’s Virtual Earth mapping technology. It’s similar to the interactive map but adds multiple angle satellite images, called High-Definition Home Search. Users can look at 45 degree angles of the property from North, South, East and West viewpoints.

There is one major difference in searching, at least from the website user’s perspective. The new mapping search doesn’t enable the cursor to draw a box around an specific area on the map. Instead, viewers need to zoom in using the “+” button and re-centering the map to get to their desired search parameter. A little inconvienient.

About a week after introducing the High-Definition Home Search, John L. Scott then made sold data available. This move empowers buyers and sellers alike to make smart decisions by accessing up-to-date sold data from the Northwest MLS. Unlike other sites that use data from county records (updates months after a home has sold), the NWMLS data is real time.

Finally, John L. Scott provides potential home buyers (seller’s will benefit from this info, too), Community Details. This feature provides information about housing inventory, market stability, weather, population and economic demographics, school information, nearby services and businesses, and home sale activity data. This is a very cool tool.

Community Characteristics:

School Information:

Home Sale Activity Report:

John L. Scott has bucked the trend of the stuffy traditional full-service brokerages by empowering consumers with the information they need to make quality buying and/or selling decisions. And, while these tools are useful, they merely supplement the services of a good real estate agent. Professional agents have added benefits by providing expert knowledge of the market (many specialize in geographic areas or housing types), understanding the nuances of real estate contracts and negotiations, and analyzing buying or selling strategies based on their clients needs and requirements.

Though they’ve been around for awhile, I recently learned of another real estate technology company operating out of the Seattle area called ActiveRain. Unlike the other Seattle area companies (Zillow, Redfin, HouseValues) that are consumer-focused, ActiveRain’s business is aimed at providing lead management solutions for web-based real estate companies, principally Brio and WhyNotOwn.com. From a press release last year:

ActiveRain combines an intelligent CRM designed specifically around how real estate agents work. Powerful communication tools, such as automated form letters, a task management/calendaring system, and a full blown transaction management system to bring all involved parties together.

One of the aspects that make the transactional management system so revolutionary is the ability to ‘invite’ all of the individuals involved into a home purchase transaction. Everyone can then stay up to date on the current status of the purchase, share documents electronically and keep a history of important communications.

Not long ago they launched a directory type website allowing agents and mortgage lenders to create profiles aimed towards potential buyers and sellers. Basically, this benefits agents and lenders who are hoping to acquire internet leads. Of course, I created a profile for myself.