Higher Levels of ‘Walkability’ Linked to Higher Home Values

As reported on BuzzBuzzHome blog (weird name, great blog!), a new study shows that higher levels of ‘walkability’ are directly linked to higher home values.

The report, “Walking the Walk: How Walkability Raises Housing Values in U.S. Cities,” looked at 94,000 real-estate transactions in 15 markets across the U.S.

The report was commissioned by a group called CEO’s for Cities and uses the Walkscore web service that we have integrated within all of our UniqueHomeSites.

WalkScore allows you to view the ‘walkability’ of any known location, drawing in community points of interest from Google’s vast directory of local stores, restaurants, schools, parks, etc. to calculate a walking distance score.

You can even interact with Walkscore to improve the walkability of your listings.

To improve your listings’ Walk Score, you can easily add and delete amenities yourself.

1. From the local amenities link on your UniqueHomeSite click on the “bigger map” link in the top right corner of the Walkscore box.

2. On the right, above the list of amenities is a link titled “missing something“. Click on this and follow the instructions to add the missing amenity to Google maps.

For any point of interest, you only have to add it once. It will be available for all your future listings for that neighbourhood. 

Its a great way to provide potential homebuyers with valuable information and perhaps fetch a higher price for your listings!

Custom Branded Single Property Websites

We are often getting requests from our user community to develop a single property website template that matches their personal brand as a real estate professional.

This is why we have introduced our Custom Branding Solution!

Upon request, we will engage our team of Graphic Designers to work with you to create your own unique and completely customized property website design.

Need an agent site? Hey, we also do that!

They come equipped with a powerful control panel, and are completely integrated with our UniqueHomeSites product… but that’s another blog post altogether.

Check out a few of our custom property website designs:

Jim Cooper, RE/MAX Metro-City Realty Ltd. – http://www.1111waterpark.com/

 

Sean McCann, Royal LePage Team Realty Ltd. - http://www.282friel.com/

Andrea Morrison, Royal LePage Real Estate Services Ltd. – http://www.8lessard.com/

 

Prudential Connecticut Realty develops Single Property Websites

A recent posting on GeekEstate blog by Vincent Socci, Marketing Manager of Prudential Connecticut Realty, discusses the benefits of single property websites.

Living in a web 2.0 world, consumers are demanding fresher and more descriptive information about homes for sale…. single-property sites are exceptional ways to not only ‘seal the deal’ by wowing your sellers but are also a great marketing tool that allow you to center your marketing strategy around an easy to remember URL. 

According to the blog post (and ensuing comments), it appears that Prudential Conneticut have taken the lead by developing their own exclusive single property website technology - Home Suite. Nice work Vincent!

If you are a broker operating in Canada and would like to have single property websites available to your agents, contact us at Base 10 Web Solutions! 

Here is a sample of our clients’ property websites:

http://www.5545dickinsonstreet.com/

http://www.635caracaradrive.com/

http://www.11cathcartsquare.com/

http://www.5354kilbylane.com/

 

 

 

Discover video marketing techniques in the blogosphere!

Peyman Aleagha from GeekEstate blog writes a great posting on the use of online video for real estate marketing.

For those real estate agents considering a video marketing campaign, this is a must read.

Here’s an excerpt:

What percentage of your real estate customers come from out of your area? They need information about the area, attractions, natural beauty, parks, schools and more. But, they also want to SEE what all of this looks like. Photos are great, but video rocks!

Joel Burslem from the Future of Real Estate Marketing blog (who knew he’s Canadian?) also comments on the use of video on his posting entitled Video Isn’t Just About Your Listings.

Introducing Brian Scott as Approved UniqueHomeSites Reseller

Real estate professionals in Gatineau now have the chance to take advantage of Scott Photography’s services with photographer Brian Scott. He is able to photograph homes in the Ottawa area as well.

Brian, as an approved UniqueHomeSites reseller, is able to provide his photographic services package to real estate professionals in the Ottawa and Gatineau area for roughly $130 dollars as an introductory price.

His package includes a visit to the property to take up to 20 web-ready still photos, and 3 panoramic virtual tours, as well as all the features and benefits provided by a UniqueHomeSite, including a unique domain name ( ie, www.123uniquestreet.com) and hosting of the site for one year.

To contact Brian, and to find out more, visit http://www.uniquehomesites.com/photographers

Century 21 reaches out to Consumers with Web 2.0

With many real estate agencies stuck in the Internet dark ages, it is refreshing to see how companies like Century 21 have enhanced their web presence with consumer-friendly initiatives.

Take Century21.ca, for example. Their website was recently recognized by Joel Burslem, founder of Future of Real Estate Marketing, as one of his favorite real estate search experiences on line today.

It includes a blog and an awesome new Google map search functionality, which displays the locations of their listings. 

Meanwhile, Century21.com just launched its own YouTube channel. Aimed at sellers, buyers and enthusiasts, the Channel will provide the opportunity for customers and agents to create and submit user-generated content. 

“The CENTURY 21 System understands that in order to serve our clients and meet the demands of today’s market, we must lead the industry with the most current home buying and selling platforms,” said Robert Schwartz , vice president of national marketing for Century 21 Real Estate LLC. “During the next year we will continue to build on this momentum with additional Web-based innovations to help our agents and our clients navigate the world of real estate in a digital era.”

At Base10, we promote the use of web 2.0 and thats why we have an integrated set of features in our UniqueHomeSites.com product, which allow Canadian real estate professionals to better serve consumers through compelling web content.

Real Estate Agencies in Canada Need a Competitive Edge in 2008

In a recent poll conducted by Royal Bank of Canada, home buying intentions among Canadian consumers have slipped to their lowest level in years, as reported on GlobeandMail.com.

Across Canada, home buying intentions slipped by 5 percentage points year over year to 23 per cent, according to the Ipsos Reid poll. The number of respondents who said they were “very likely” to buy dropped from 9 per cent last year to 7 per cent in 2008, the lowest level since the poll was started 15 years ago.

When asked how likely they are to purchase a home within the next two years, here is how Canadian’s responded:

Very likely: 7%

Somewhat likely: 16%

Not very likely: 28%

Not likely at all: 49%

Total vote: 3,022

With fewer home buyers, sales representatives will not only have greater difficulties in selling their existing listings in 2008, but there will also be greater competition among agents for new listings as people stay put in their homes.

At Base 10 Web Solutions, we offer real estate sales representative in Canada a ‘unique’ way to stay competitive with our single property website solution – www.UniqueHomeSites.com. Our web-based site building wizard simplifies the process of building a professional-looking website within minutes.

Not only do single property websites tell clients that selling their home is a priority, they are packed with useful information for consumers, including photos, video, maps, a school locator, neighbourhood demographics, as well as an easy-to-remember domain name.    

Introducing Alex Lukey as Approved UniqueHomeSites Photographer

Ottawa-area real estate professionals can now benefit from having a UniqueHomeSites single property website, complete with the professional real estate photography services of Alex Lukey Photography.

As an approved vendor for UniqueHomeSites, Alex is able to provide his photographic services package to real estate professionals in the Ottawa area for a competitive price.

This includes a visit to the property to capture up to 20 web-ready still photos, and 3 panoramic images, and all the features and benefits associated with a UniqueHomeSite, including a unique domain name (i.e.www.123UniqueStreet.com) and hosting of the site for one year.

Educated consumers = less work, more money for Canadian real estate professionals

Lloyd Frink, president of Zillow.com, posted an interesting article on RISMedia.com, entitled ‘For Tech-Savvy Consumers, Real Estate Agents are Still the Experts’.

The article discusses the recent phenomenon of websites (including Zillow.com) offering consumers easy access to a wealth of information on local housing market conditions, neighbourhood information, and other homebuying tips.

This is a drastic change from the pre-Internet days when real estate agents were the gate-keepers of this type of information.

Should real estate professionals be concerned?

Not so, explains Mr. Frink: 

“A recent study by the California Association of Realtors reported that home buyers who used the Internet as a significant portion of their home-buying experience spent an average of two weeks with a Realtor looking at homes, compared to those who did not use the Internet, who spent an average of seven weeks looking for their home.

The wealth of tools and information available online takes away a lot of the “hand holding” traditionally expected of real estate agents, which allows them to take on a higher volume of clients, and ultimately, make more money.”

In fact, single property websites from UniqueHomeSites.com offer Canadian real estate professionals the ability to harness the power of the Internet by automatically ‘pulling’ together relevant information from a variety of sources into a neatly packaged website, dedicated to a single listing.

With a UniqueHomeSite, consumers can browse everything related to a specific property, including photos, property descriptions, video, local schools, neighbourhood demographics, plus much more.

Not only do consumers benefit from the wealth of information available on the site, recipricol links back to the agents website makes it easy for them to make contact when they are ready to engage the agent to start a transaction.

Homebuyers want information before talking to a Real Estate Salesperson

An article appeared on the Winnipeg Free Press website last week, discussing how the Internet has changed the way consumers shop for real estate.

The author, Deborah Bowers, draws interesting comparisons with other consumer market segments such as electronics, music, and books.

Real estate is a market segment in which the Web is having significant impact. In the past, interested customers would phone a Realtor’s paging service, leave their phone number, and wait in trepidation for real or perceived pressure to buy, sell or at least set up a meeting.

Today, the Internet has given even tire-kickers the expectation of being able to find out what they want, when they want it — in virtual anonymity.

To help Canadian real estate professionals cope with an increasing demand for more information, UniqueHomeSites.com packages information from a variety of sources into a content-rich single property website, offering a ‘unique’ online experience for homebuyers.

An easy-to-use site building wizard automatically generates integrated links for the real estate agent, offering neighbourhood mapping and demographics, property video, a school locator, unlimited photos, and a mortgage calculator.