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Lessons In Assessment Challenge From Rochester's Re-valuation

Rochester, NY just finished its 2008 (every 4 years) City-wide tax reassessment. "All Real Estate is Local", and that goes for Real Estate Assessments too. Your local tax assessment process may be different. Even so, there are many lessons to learn about challenging your assessment from Rochester's 2008 Re-valuation.

The Rochester Process:

• December 2007, Rochester property owners received notice of the change in their home valuations.
• Owners had until 3/18/08 to either request an informal review or file a formal challenge with Rochester's Assessor's Office.
• Formal challenges are heard by the 12 member Board of Assessment Review (made up of City residents with Real Estate experience).
• Formal challengers can negotiate privately before the matter is presented to the Board.
• 5/1/08 was the deadline for the City to finalize the assessment role.
• After the Board Decision, dissatisfied challengers can still take their case to court.

The Rochester Numbers:

• 66,700+ properties in the City of Rochester
• 11.5% increase in valuation since 4 years ago
• 41% with an increase and 59% with either a decrease or no change
• 4,200 (16%) property challenges
• 66% of property assessments successfully challenged
• 6.9% average reduction in assessment. (When I helped my future Mother-In-Law challenge her assessment, her reduction went from $118K to $110K, or 6.8%)
• 550 (13%) of challengers made formal appeals to the Assessment Board.

Percent challenges varied by area from just above 0 to just over 20%. The highest areas of challenge were in the areas where the valuations went up the most. The lowest areas for challenges were where the valuations went down.

One local condominium group challenged their reassessments. Through their Owners Associations they hired a property appraiser and filed their challenges. The group of 97 owners had their assessments reduced by 7%, from 20% to 13%.

Take Home Points:

• To challenge, or not to challenge? Is the challenge worth your time, money and aggravation? Your home's market value and its assessed value should be the same.
• Be Prepared: Know your local system and find Comparables (Zillow.com, RealEstateABC.com, a Real Estate Agent, an Appraiser)
• Document: Photos, Comparables, estimates and copies for the appraisal officer
• Pick Your Battle: 1) Home features 2) Comparables 3) Condition
• Be professional: Take 5 minutes to make your bullet points, be polite and respectful.
• Resolve Informally: Try to resolve your challenge informally

With a 2/3s success rate for property challenges, Rochester is a good place to challenge your assessment. 87% of challenges were resolved without going before the Board.

In today's often down Real Estate Market, if you purchase a home below assessment, you can immediately challenge your assessment. Your home's assessed value should equal its market value.

The 3 most important things in Real Estate may still be "Location, Location, Location". But the 3 most important things in challenging a Real Estate Assessment are: "Document, Document, Document".

Happy Searching.

Posted by: Cliff Jacobson

Adapt Or Die!

WebHomeUSAblog: The Blog of Online Real Estate Marketing

Top Ten Tips To Challenge Your Assessment

Monroe County and Rochester NY, are now going through their 4 year cycle of property reassessment. There's been a lot of griping about assessment increases, which seem based more on the peak of the Real Estate bubble, than on the reality of the sub-prime mess.

Adding to all the local excitement, Tom Golisano, founder of Paychex, has had a well publicized fight with his tax assessor. His home value is assessed at $5MM vs his value of $2MM. Mr Golisano has run several full page ads in our local paper telling home owners how to best fight their tax assessment. He points out with assessments: you're "Guilty until proven innocent". In other words: you need to prove the assessment wrong. The assessor doesn't need to prove himself right.

In my review of several articles, online and offline, local and national, and my own experience of challenging assessments twice, I found my Top Ten Tips To Challenge Your Assessment:

1) Should You Challenge Your Assessment? Depends. If you think your home would sell for much more than the assessment, it may not be worth your time and effort. Some people challenge their estimate every time, but it may not be worth the effort and expense for you to mount a challenge.

2) Preparation. You'll have to do research and provide data, information and pictures for documentation to support your case. You'll get what you pay for, in time and money, as well as help. Practice Hard. Play Easy.

3) Find out about your Assessor. Your local assessor's offices has a personality (easy, tough, fair). You can often find out about their attitude by asking friends, neighbors and Real Estate Agents. If your assessor tends to be lenient (66% challengers got reductions in Rochester, NY), it may be wise to contest your assessment. If your assessor is tough, it may not be worth the bother and aggravation.

The numbers for the 2008 Rochester assessment:

• 66,700+ properties in the City of Rochester
• 4,200 (16%) property challenges
• 66% of property assessments successfully challenged
• 6.9% average reduction in assessment.

4) Find out about your Assessment Process. All Real Estate is Local. And All Real Estate Assessment is Local, too. The assessment process varies with jurisdiction. Information and forms to challenge your assessment should be available at your assessor's office, and now often online. Make sure you comply with deadlines and other basic requirements.

• "I'm so sorry. Your time is up."
• "I'd like to help you, but I can't."
• "Have a nice day."

5) Get your Assessment. Although this may seem obvious, in some jurisdictions they make it difficult to find out exactly what your assessment is. You may also need to do calculations in areas not using 100% valuations.

6) Check Home Information. One way to have your assessment lowered is to challenge the description and features of your home. Make sure the square footage, lot size, number of bedrooms and bathrooms and garage size are correct. Might the assessor be counting unfinished space in the basement or garage; or improvements you don't have? Document with pictures when and where possible.

7) Check Comparables. This is how the assessor calculated the value of your home, and your best way to dispute your assessment. In the past you might have used a Realtor to get comparables. Today you can find comparables on Zillow.com, RealEstateABC.com, Eppraisal.com and a number of others. If worse comes to worse, you can get comparables at the assessor's office. Some jurisdictions now have them online. It's suggested you get 3 to 5 homes comparable for: square footage, lot size, age and style. Compare a ranch with a ranch. Most Assessors use computer programs which may not be up to date on the data or the condition, and rely too much on square footage.

Two local high-rise condominiums saw their assessments rise by 20 or 21 percent. The owners hired a property appraiser through their condo board and filed appeals. Their increases were reduced to 13 percent, well worth the investment.

8) Document Condition. Condition can be important in challenging your assessment. At best your Assessor has done an exterior evaluation of your home (Our County has purchase the "Birdeye View" from Pictometry). Does your home need a new roof, a new driveway or other major repairs? Bring pictures and possibly even estimates. Document, Document, Document.

9) Informal Proceedings. Most jurisdictions have informal proceedings. This is usually the best place to resolve issues. Generally when there is an adjustment, the difference between the old assessment and the new assessment is split. Be prepared to:

• Be Professional: Make your case clearly and succinctly (Answer the question,"Why should this house be valued lower?")
• Be Prepared: (Take it from the Boy Scouts) Document your case completely (Photos, estimates, comparables and other documents). Write down what you plan to say. Practice it with family and friends. Make copies for the assessor (The person you meet with often doesn't make the decision there and may need to present it to someone else and justify his decision.).
• Be Polite. Courtesy can go a long way. Remember, you may be the 20th person he's spoken with already today. "You can catch more flies with sugar, than with vinegar."

10) Formal Appeal. Many jurisdictions have a formal board where you can take disputes after the informal meetings and before a court hearing. These formal appeals are often open to the public. You may be able to attend, which should help you in your own preparation. It may be wise here to have the more formal documentation of a Real Estate Agent or a Certified Appraiser ($300-$600).

When all else fails, you can take your challenge to court. You'll have to calculate the court costs in terms of your time, as well as your legal fees.

If you purchase a home below assessment (more common now with the bubble bursting), you can often challenge your assessment right away.

In my challenges, I won both times, with 25% and 50% increase reductions. I haven't been as lucky with my parking tickets.

Happy Searching.

Posted by: Cliff Jacobson

Adapt Or Die!

WebHomeUSAblog: The Blog of Online Real Estate Marketing

Trulia Takes Zillow-Like Heat

Well, it happened at last. Trulia is finally taking some Zillow-Like heat from the Real Estate Community. So much for the welcoming and warm embrace tauted by the NAR and the Real Estate community to the DOJ (Department of Justice) for all the new Real Estate models.

The NAR, Move, Realtor.com and all the Broker Websites just got caught with their Google Page Placements down.

Now Zillow isn't the only spear catcher for the ad-sale-model of Real Estate Websites. Trulia has never sold a house and offers agents and brokers free advertising and exposure, but they must be doing something wrong. Realtors provide Web-pages for homes. So Trulia can't.

The NAR ePro designation, the CRS course on "Driving Buyers To Your Website" and many articles in NAR publications taut SEO (Search Engine Optimization). Trulia works SEO into their virtual DNA and now the NAR is all over their case. Be careful what you wish for. Mike Ferry must have a script for it. (I've called Pete Flint of Trulia, "The CEO of SEO".)

You mean the Broker and Agent Websites aren't as good as Real Estate Agents say they are? And there's an easy way to check, on Google, where I do all my other searches? You mean Google agrees with Trulia about its Result Page Position vs yours.

Trulia has embraced SEO for the street address. The address is right there in the domain name(Trulia.com/123MainStAnywhereNY11000). This means Trulia is not only optimized for the whole address (Google the street address of any home-for-sale address on Trulia), but also for the Zip Code and the City or Town. With Trulia's Top Ten Traffic for Real Estate, no wonder they're so high upon every address search for directions.

Realtor.com has just started adding parts of the street address to their domains/Web-pages for their listings. They're late to the game, but with the most traffic in all of Real Estatedom, anything can happen.

Trulia hasn't done anything illegal or unethical. Trulia has just tapped into the ad sale revenue which NAR, Move, Realtor.com and all the Agent and Broker Websites have left on the table.

Be careful Mr. Flint. The NAR, Move and Realtor.com don't always play fair.

Keep your SEO powder dry.

Happy Searching.

Posted by: Cliff Jacobson

Adapt Or Die!

WebHomeUSAblog: The Blog of Online Real Estate Marketing

Build It. They Will Come. For Real Estate?

In Field of Dreams, a movie about the last Great American Pastime before Internet Cruising, Shoeless Joe Jackson tells Kevin Costner's character, "Build it. He (They) will come." But does this advice hold for Real Estate Websites, the Realtor's Field of Internet Dreams?

Recently 2 Websites, Trulia and Zillow, have been fighting it out for dominance in the Online Real Estate Marketplace. Trulia leads with comScore's unique visitor rankings, while Zillow leads on Hitwise's market share numbers. together these sites have more traffic than any Real Estate Website other than the NAR and Move's Website, Realtor.com.

Zillow, the Seattle start-up, generates a Web-page for almost every home in the US with a "CMA Light", called a Zestimate in about 10 seconds. "Quick and Dirty" is getting better as the computer algorithm improves and their data is more current. Zillow relies on Owners, Agents and Brokers to supply their listing data, has their own increased-traffic algorithm to spot homes for sale and a recent contract with 11 Newspaper Syndicates to supply their listing data. (But only 10% of homes for sale ever appear in the papers.)

Trulia, from San Francisco, started as a mapping mash-up and has proceeded to dominate street address searches on Google for all the homes Agents and Brokers push out to them. Trulia's Web-pages and domain names are optimized for the street address and any part of the street address. Trulia's SEO (Search Engine Optimization) generates a great deal of Google Search Traffic. I guess this makes Pete Flint the "SEO CEO", at least of Real Estate.

In Western New York, many people have heard of Zillow, but few have heard of Trulia. I guess they haven't searched on the home address or Zip Code of the property they're looking for recently.

The big questions for these Real Estate Verticals with Ad-Sale Models are:

• Once built, will they come?
• Once they come, will they click?

Since Trulia and Zillow are privately held, they don't have to reveal their CTR (click-through-rate). And always remember there are: "Lies, Damn Lies, Statistics, and Real Estate Numbers", and my other favorite Real Estate sayings and advice:

• "If you can't be #1 in your niche, find a new niche."
• "You've got to be number one in something."
• "Ninety-five percent of all Real Estate numbers are made upon the spot."

Locally (WNY), few Agents and Brokers have taken up Trulia and Zillow's free offers to post Agent contact information and pictures. I'm surprised when I search on Google for the addresses of some of the most expensive properties in Rochester.There is no Agent information (free to the agent) on the Trulia page for that address. As Trulia and Zillow get bigger and dominate the market, it may not only be dumb, but also become a violation of our fiduciary responsibilities to our clients to not put our contact information on the Trulia and Zillow listing Web-pages.

Western New York is still pretty conservative. Many Realtors are still suspicious of Zillow. They're not as suspicious of Trulia, because Trulia gives maps and general information. Realtors don't see Trulia as much of a direct threat as Zillow, which provides a Virtual CMA.

Build it. They will come, for Real Estate?

We'll soon see for Trulia, Zillow and Real Estate.

The buyers eyes are coming, but how soon the Agents, the Brokers and the Advertisers Dollars?

Happy Searching.

Posted by: Cliff Jacobson

Adapt Or Die!

WebHomeUSAblog: The Blog of Online Real Estate Marketing

Top Ten Foreclosure Myths

At a recent Real Estate Seminar on foreclosures in Rochester, NY there was a discussion about the myths regarding foreclosures. All Real Estate is Local. And that holds particularly true for the laws surrounding foreclosures (particularly involving bankruptcy).

Upstate New York generally did not experience the irrational exuberance of much of the rest of the country and the sub-prime mess has only had indirect effects. Here are New York's Top Ten Foreclosure Myths (Maybe your state has its own myths):

1) Paid Foreclosure Listing Sites (Some of the top 20 most visited Real Estate Websites) have the best deals and I should join. Locally the inventory of the paid sites are not up to date. There is usually a local publication (In Rochester it's The Daily Record) which lists all the foreclosures and when they're coming up for auction on "the court room steps" (Monroe County Court House).

2) You need to pay the full purchase in cash. Cash is King in foreclosures too, but you don't have to come with all cash. You can be pre-approved by a bank for your mortgage. In Cash vs Finance deals, Cash has more power and strength usually wins again.

3) The bank wants to get all they've invested in the property. In an ideal world this is true. But the foreclosure land is rarely an ideal world. What the bank wants and what the bank gets are 2 different things. Just like most investors, the banks won't move off their price right away. But in several months, with carrying charges for the home being about 1% per month, banks are much more likely to negotiate.

4) Foreclosures are disasters and they all need work. Some foreclosures are disasters and some aren't. But "As Is" means "As Is". Look before you leap. The banks hold all the cards, so be confident in your hand before you deal.

5) You can have a property inspection, just like a residential property. You'll get a smile out of the banker if you make your purchase offer contingent on a property inspection. Take your inspector or your contractor on your inspection.

6) A property disclosure is required by the bank, so I'm safe and protected if I don't find something. Banks may disclose,but in NYS they are not bound to disclose and "As Is" still means "As Is".

7) You can close on the foreclosed property whenever you want. Again, the bank holds all the cards. This is one of the few areas where "date certain" means"date certain". "Drop Dead Date" also means "Drop Dead Date", and your deposit is now the banks money. Bankers often get bonuses to close by the end of a month and there's often a fine of $100/day for delayed closings.

8) I'll put a home sale contingency on my foreclosure offer. This also makes the bankers smile. You may be able to negotiate a mortgage contingency, but you won't be able to get a home sale contingency.

9) I can low-ball the bank and the bank will still consider my offer. If you have a Realtor representing you they must submit your offer. An early low-ball offer will usually get a full price counter. Low-ball offers are much more likely to be accepted after the bank has had a home on the market for several months.

10) Buying foreclosures is easy, like on TV. It's not like all those other get-rich-quick shows I see. It's so easy a Caveman with a 600+ Credit Score could do it. If it were so easy, why don't they just send someone to your market and buy all the foreclosures?

Remember those old Real Estate foreclosure sayings/warnings:

• "A fool and his money are soon parted" (Ben Franklin, aka Poor Richard)
• "If it's too good to be true, it probably is".
• "Cash is King". And "It's good to be King." (Mel Brooks)
• "The Comps don't lie"
• "Don't try this at home." (Old NAR/Realtor Proverb)

Happy Searching.

Posted by: Cliff Jacobson

Adapt Or Die!

WebHomeUSAblog: The Blog of Online Real Estate Marketing

The Light Just Went On At NAR And Move

In looking around the local Real Estate Websites for the Greater Rochester, NY area, I came across an interesting finding: On a Google Address Search for "672 WEST GENESEE ST Corfu, NY 14036", the top 2 Google Results Page positions were for Realtor.com. I had never seen a Realtor.com listing on a Google Search before.

After years of concealing their listing data on the "Hidden Web",where Search Engines are blocked, the NAR and Move have decided to use the Search Engines and SEO to drive traffic to their Realtor.com Website. They've decided that a visitor coming in through their Street Address and Town pages are just as good as Home Page visitors.

An interesting piece of advice on Internet visitors is: "General searchers are shoppers. Specific searchers are buyers." Which do you want?

Last year the New York Times opened up most of their articles to the Internet and search by the Search Engines. Their subscription revenue didn't suffer and their traffic and ad revenue soared.

When Saturday Night Live first saw their video clips on YouTube, they threatened to sue. When their viewership and ratings soared, they not only allowed their clips to go out on, they decided to provide the clips themselves. 

Realtor.com had always subscribed to the One Big Website Theory, and the philosophy of hide your individual listing data from Internet Search. So the only place you could find a Realtor.com listing was on Realtor.com. No need for Google. No need for SEO. No need for search-able Web-pages for every home. All visitors were channeled through your Website's Home-Page.

But Google Base, Yahoo Real Estate, MSN Real Estate, Zillow and Trulia have changed all that. The Web traffic Market Share for Realtor.com and Move.com is only 6.63% and Realtors are hungry to get on the other 93.37%.

Won't we loose control of our listing data? What if someone puts our listing data on a porn site? It wouldn't make for an interesting viewing, and it would make for terrible porn.

But being search-able by Google and the other search engines (heaven forbid pushing your listing data out to a search engine or 2, even a vertical search engine) has all of a sudden become an interest of Realtor.com.

I was impressed with Realtor.com's use of SEO for the individual property address and the Town

• They used the street address or Town name in the Web-page domain name
• They used the street address or Town name in the Web-page Title Tag
• They used the street address or Town name in the Web-page Description

Sounds repetitious, but it works well for SEO.

It appears the NAR, Move and Realtor.com have taken a page from the Trulia Playbook for SEO and for high Google Results Page positions to drive more traffic and potential buyers to their sites.

What's next? Realtor.com will become a media Website, selling Google Text Ads, like Zillow and Trulia?

Have the lights really gone on at the NAR and Move?

Happy Searching.

Posted by: Cliff Jacobson

Adapt Or Die!

WebHomeUSAblog: The Blog of Online Real Estate Marketing

Real Estate Website Traffic Numbers for March '08. Where's Google?

There are 2 kinds of people: Those who think there are 2 kinds of People and those who don't.

There are 2 kinds of Real Estate Websites: Those selling homes (subscription sponsored Websites like Realtor.com and the National Broker Sites) and those selling ads (Big Search Engines, Yahoo Real Estate, and Real Estate Verticals, Zillow and Trulia).

Selling homes is a lot different than selling ads. Zillow and Trulia are much more like network media, than commodity sales. Zillow and Trulia need to drive big time traffic, a home shopper at any stage of interest. Realtor.com and RE/MAX need to drive home buyers, some one who's going to buy a home in the next 30 to 90 days.

The big fear of Big Real Estate is that once the home buyer/shopper voyeurs get used to using Zillow and Trulia to find a home, they will stick with them and their advertisers to buy a home. The Realtor fear that Zillow and Trulia will steal our commission lunch, is now the reality that they will eat our advertising budget.

The traffic numbers for March '08 are much samo-samo with a little of David and Goliath and new kids on the block mixed in. But where's Google Base?

The numbers come from Hitwise and ComScore Media Metrix, the 2 most important media tracking companies for Real Estate Websites. Hitwise focuses primarily on "Market Share" which includes total traffic, most important for Ad Sale Websites. While ComScore focuses more on unique visitors, most important for Home Sale Websites.

On Hitwise, as usual, Move, with their Realtor.com and Move.com Websites based on NAR listing data, had a market share total of 6.63%, over 2x the share of RE/MAX.com, the #2 Website with a 2.85% share.

ZipRealty.com at #5, Century21.com at #13 and ColdwellBanker.com at #18 joined RE/MAX.com as the only National Broker Websites with a top 20 share.

Zillow.com came in at #4, with a 2.2% share, beating Trulia's #11, 1.47% share. Interestingly on ComScore, Trulia ranked #8 in unique visitors, while Zillow ranked #10. Those Bay City Boys are giving those Seattle Microsoft Alumni a run for their VC money.

Locally, in Rochester, NY, if you Google search the full address of a home (pushed out to Trulia), Trulia is #1, and often #2, for its page for the home's Zip Code. Zillow is no where to be found on the first 3 pages of my Google address searches.

Another interesting point is when you Google search on the whole address, at the top of the results page you get a Google Map and Google directions, ie: 220 SANDRINGHAM ROAD Rochester, NY 14610. But when you just search on: 220 SANDRINGHAM ROAD, you don't get a Google Map and Google Directions, unless you go to the first result, www.trulia.com/property/37266652-220-Sandringham-Rd-Rochester-NY-14610. Trulia is a Google Enterprise Partner using Google Maps, Google Direct ons and Google Ads. Google Analytics, anyone?

Trulia was early using SEO and putting the whole street address in the detail page's domain name. Trulia now enjoys an edge on Zillow, which is just now converting over to using the address and not just their own tracking number. Interestingly Move.com has a beta for Realtor.com, incorporating the Town, State and Zip Code in the Realtor.com domain.

Should you have directions on your home detail page? Should you push your listing data out to Trulia and Zillow? Should you put your picture and profile with your listing data on Trulia and Zillow (It's free, not like Realtor.com)?

Avoid these features at your own peril.

Trulia and Zillow, Our lunch is waiting.

Adapt Or Die!

WebHomeUSAblog: The Blog of Online Real Estate Marketing

Do As I Say, Not As I Do. The NAR And Banks

In winter, as we walked into my grammar school, there stood our principal with his hat on, telling every student to take his hat off. This is my first memory of "Do as I say, not as I do."

I was struck last year, when the Congressional lobbyists for the NAR tauted their success at keeping the banks out of Real Estate for another 2 years. Their hope had been to keep the banks out in perpetuity.

The banks, with Wells Fargo (one of the top spending Congressional Lobbyists) in the lead, hope to sell Real Estate, much as they already sell life insurance and stocks. In Real Estate, they'd become "The Discounters From Hell."

The DOJ and the FTC are breathing down our collective necks for actions in restraint of trade and unfair and non-competitive business practices. And many of these court cases, the NAR is supporting these practices with our dues dollars. Can we continue advocating for what isn't in the best interest of our clients?

Freakonomics likens us Realtors to the KKK. Wasn't it bad enough when we were compared to used car salesmen? In Freakonomics they showed that Realtors kept their own homes on the market longer than the homes of our clients.

In a different way we can cut more costs and make more money by becoming discounters ourselves, selling more homes for less and turning over our inventory 20-40% more often. Does anyone still believe the discounter's motto: "Your first offer is your best offer", at least if you're the agent.

Lawyers are trained to take argue both sides of an argument. Realtors are trained to talk out of both sides of our mouths.

We tout our tolerance for different models to the DOJ. Yet we fight those different models in the field, in our MLSs and in court.

How much longer can we fight our data being broadcast out on the Internet? My local AR makes a home owner sign a waiver allowing us to put a for sale sign on their lawn. Shouldn't there also be a waiver to not put a virtual for sale sign out every where on the Internet?

Is it better to keep our listing data just on our own Websites or push out our data to Zillow, Trulia, Google Base, Yahoo Real Estate and MSN?

Isn't it in the best interest of our clients (to whom we owe fiducary responsibilities) to get their home's listing data out to the 70+% of home buyers who start their home search on the Internet?

If the NAR keeps its focus on the DOJ, the FTC, the discounters, the banks and the Internet, we'll loose site of our goal and trip over our future and the best ways to sell a home.

Happy Searching.

Posted by: Cliff Jacobson

Adapt Or Die!

WebHomeUSAblog: The Blog of Online Real Estate Marketing

Nordstroms, Directions, Site Maps And SEO?

In any Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Course these days you'll hear about the critical importance of your site map. A good site map shows visitors how to navigate your site, adding to their overall experience. You only get one chance to make a good impression, goes for Websites, too.

A good site map also shows/tells your visitors you've thought of them ahead of time. And that they're important to you. If you don't show them where to go, they'll show you where to go. An extra click, is a click away.

The Nordstroms Customer Service Playbook says: Never "walk" a customer. Wonder why most Nordstroms have vallet parking, comfortable chairs with sports magazines in all women's areas and the least expensive coffee in the mall? Never walk a customer.

Nordstroms doesn't want any customer to "walk". In other words, leave their store. And you don't want your customer to leave your Website. Nordstroms wants to be their customer's one-stop-shop for every thing clothes. You want your Website to be your customer's one-stop-shop for everything Real Estate.

Wonder why there are so many stories of Nordstroms employees going to other stores to buy higher priced sizes Nordstroms didn't have. And selling those items at Nordstroms' reduced price?

"Walking" a customer is making them leave your store to find what they want. The vallet-parked Nordstrom's customer has to walk all the way through the store twice, even if they don't stop to buy anything. A link, opening in a new window, makes your customer come back through your site to shut down the computer.

With the Google Toolbar pre-installed on every Dell Computer and many people checking the Google Page Rank for their Website, more and more people have the Google Toolbar on their Home-Page.

Want directions to your listing? Not on your site? No problem. Your visitor/home buyer only has to copy and paste the home's address (or even part of the address) and plug it into the Google Search Box (On the Google Toolbar or on the Google Website). (Does anyone use MapQuest anymore?)

Up pops the Google Results Page for your listings' address. Google provides a schematic map with a push-pin for your listing and an offer to provide driving directions.

But, right under the map and the directions:

• Guess who's there?
• Guess how many times they're there?
• Guess why they're there?

Trulia's there (if your listing is pushed out to Trulia). And usually with 2 placements. One for the Address Page and another for the Zip Code Page (No Zillow. At least not yet).

It doesn't hurt Trulia's Google placements, that they're an Enterprise Partner with Google; using Google Maps, Google Ads and Google Directions (and I bet, Google Analytics too).

And you thought you'd save money by not having directions on your site. And by skimping on SEO.

Guess why you'd better have directions on your site?

Guess why you'd better have SEO in your marketing budget?

Happy Searching.

Posted by: Cliff Jacobson

Adapt Or Die!

WebHomeUSAblog: The Blog of Online Real Estate Marketing

A National MLS, One Property At A Time

A National MLS is the Holy Grail of every relocation home buyer:

• Home buyer friendly/Easy to access
• Home buyer first/Realtor Second
• A listing of all properties (listed, new construction and FSBO) for sale
• A non-biased (not broker-biased) presentation
• A one-stop-shop for all local and national things Real Estate

The usual suspects:

• Realtor.com: The most listings, the most traffic, but too focused on the Realtor and not (and never) containing properties from non-Realtors, many builders and FSBOs.
• GoogleBase: Google has a map and directions for every property in the US, but Google Base has not yet engaged Google's Bank Account or mind set to put out a National MLS. Also, Google has the best "Street Address Search" of any of the big 3 Search Engines (or the Big One plus two)
• Yahoo Real Estate: Yahoo has the best General Search Engine Real Estate Search, but is loosing focus to it's own survival with its deal with Microsoft (Yahoo is still trying to cover their Bear Stern).
• MSN: MSN's only hope lies in its purchase of Yahoo, or dropping Bill out of the Top 10 richest in the world. The past great minds of MSN Real Estate are all at Zillow.
• Zillow.com: Zillow's approach to a National MLS is by giving a valuation to every property, whether it's for sale or not. Zillow still draws attacks, animus and venom from Realtors, who don't understand Zillow's business model. Realtors still feel Zillow is stealing their fire by offering a computer/algorithm generated valuation in 6 seconds (The Six Second CMA). Zillow is still openly vocal about not going after a National MLS (Brer Zillow: "Don't throw me in that briar patch").

In trying to Search Engine Optimize (SEO) my own Website, WebHomeUSA.com for Street Address and the Zip Code searches in the Greater Rochester (NY) Area, I found a curious thing: My competition wasn't Realtor.com, the big local brokers or even Zillow.com.

My competition, there, right under my nose and my radar screen, was Trulia.com:

• What if Trulia has the first 2 placements on the Google Address Search for every home for sale?
• What if Trulia has the first 2 placements on the Google Search for every part of the home address? (That's searches for: "123 Main St", "123 Main St, 14607", "123 Main St, Rochester, NY", "Main St, 14607", etc)
• What if Trulia has the first 2 placements on the Google Search for "homes for sale" and "Real Estate" in every Zip Code?

They usually do. At least in Rochester, NY.

By optimizing for Google with address-linked domain names and relevant page content, and by buying ads on Yahoo's Zip Code "homes-for-sale" searches, Trulia has cornered the search engine placement market for Street Address and Zip Code searches on the top 2 Search Engines. And for very little of their $17+ MM VC bucks.

It doesn't hurt Trulia's page placement that they're a Google Enterprise Map Partner. (One hand maps the other.) Trulia is often the only placement on the first page with a business model, selling Google Ads. Do you believe Google's Ad Relevancy Spiders are much different than their Content Relevancy Spiders? I don't think so.

By approaching Realtors with an advanced Google mapping function (not a previous Realtor service, like Zillow's home valuation) Trulia has already been able to capture a top ten Real Estate Search market share. And Trulia did it without alienating its biggest data suppliers and potential advertisers, Realtors.

My vote for the ultimate Holy Grail, National MLS provider: Trulia.com, The next "Little Search Engine That Could".

Happy Searching.

Posted by: Cliff Jacobson

Adapt Or Die!

WebHomeUSAblog: The Blog of Online Real Estate Marketing