REALTOR.com debuted its new iPhone app yesterday, a search-for-homes app for the consumer.
Though it has its good functions, there are others out there which serve the public very well in their home search capabilities. I wanted to research and review the top ones for buyers and sellers to use when out looking at neighborhoods.
I decided to write a series reviewing each of the five apps chosen in depth with photos and how-tos to best use them. All of the apps I will be reviewing are free downloads to your iPhone.
First is the new one, Realtor.com ‘s Real Estate Search.
Rather user friendly, upon first blush. You get the houses in the surrounding 1 mile area of where your GPS locates you.
You can hit refine and add in price ranges, bedrooms, baths, etc. You can click on “Street” and view where these houses are in relation to where you are currently. You can also see in Satellite view, which is neat but not really useful. Finally, you can create an account save your searches, including your agent’s email address and a friend’s email address. These are all very user friendly, and great functions.
In viewing some of the properties, it can be very detailed, and of great use. If the listing agent pays for premium service (I will get more into that shortly), then there are multiple easy ways for a consumer to contact the listing agent — clicking a button, a phone number, or an email address.
The bad: The houses are listed in order of whether the listing agent pays for the premium Realtor.com service, rather than relevance to your search. It also does not link directly to the Multiple Listing Service, so the number of photos is based on what type of premium plan an agent may have signed up for, (of which there are many choices), rather than the number of pictures the agent has posted for most web based home search engines.
Realtor.com was originally designed to be a website for its dues paying National Association of Realtors® members to have a place to show their listings at a national level. The site is now a place with very little information disseminated to the consumer unless the Realtor® pays a very large sum of money in addition to their dues to the Realtor.com company.
With so many sites out there with much more information, many Realtor®s do not subscribe to the premium services, finding other sites to be much more effective for their clients.
This makes this app, though good, not the most effective one for a home search tool.
Look for my upcoming reviews on the other real estate apps — Trulia app, the Zillow app, Better Homes & Gardens app, and the Blue Atlas app.
Thanks Marney for helping us share the great news about the new Realtor.com Real Estate Search iPhone app.
We’d love it if you’d check out the social media integration feature enabling users to share listings with their Realtors and friends via email, Facebook and Twitter in real time. And I think you’ll LOVE the My Notes & Ratings feature designed to help buyers save notes on each property so they can share them with their Realtor.
Hey…and BTW…users can find nearby homes for sale or nearby open house events within 20 miles of the iPhone app users location by tapping the refine button at the top right hand side of the screen.
We agree with you community information is really important and must be available for a complete and meaningful home search experience. So please visit the Find Homes Values and Find a Neighborhood features on the homepage of Realtor.com. Everything from sold data on properties in the neighborhood within 24-hours of a sale to info on schools, community services, buyer and seller agents, census and public records data and more…and it’s FREE and available to everyone.
Thanks again for helping us share the news, especially as we all head into home buying season. Based on the demographics of most iPhone users, we expect this will be a useful home search tool that millions of first time home buyers will use with their local Realtor to find their first home.
[…] app is much better than the Realtor.com iPhone app to view more photos and details of a property. I really like this app except for the lack of cell […]