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Finding the perfect house using open data

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Re: Finding the perfect house using open data

#21

Post by smacktoward »

Hovertruck wrote: post #17
cjoh wrote: post #2

The biggest users of the open data movement are, in fact, real estate professionals. It's companies like Trulia and Estately and Zillow and what not that are actually taking open data from government and putting it to good use. It'd be interesting to see some kind of startup come out of this. Though it's fairly hands-on, real estate is still a fairly hands on market, and with real estate lobbying being what it is, it…

I know it's anecdotal, but most realtors I have met actively dislike Trulia/Zillow/etc

That's right, because they generally have their own proprietary source of data (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_listing_service), which is a big part of the appeal of working with a realtor -- they learn of new listings faster than you can by relying on public, "open source" data.

And realtors aren't stupid; they noticed what happened when other professions that were built on closed data opened their databases up to the public. Travel agents, for instance, used to be the only ones who could search the SABRE database (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabre_%28computer_system%29), which made it valuable to work with an agent when making your travel plans. Then in the '80s the company behind SABRE started opening it up to the public, first via services like CompuServe and AOL, and then later via the Web. Suddenly travelers didn't need a travel agent anymore; they could get the same booking data right from their computer. And travel agencies as a business sector promptly collapsed (http://www.cnn.com/2013/10/03/travel/travel-agent-survival/).

For this reason, the real estate agents have little desire to see MLS data show up in publicly-accessible services like Zillow. The current state of affairs appears to be that it does eventually flow out to them, but with a significant (1 week+) delay -- which lets the agents preserve their status as the people you have to talk to if you want the freshest data.

Re: Finding the perfect house using open data

#22

Post by bicknergseng »

Hovertruck wrote: post #17
cjoh wrote: post #2

The biggest users of the open data movement are, in fact, real estate professionals. It's companies like Trulia and Estately and Zillow and what not that are actually taking open data from government and putting it to good use. It'd be interesting to see some kind of startup come out of this. Though it's fairly hands-on, real estate is still a fairly hands on market, and with real estate lobbying being what it is, it…

I know it's anecdotal, but most realtors I have met actively dislike Trulia/Zillow/etc

I personally actively dislike Trulia/Zillow. More scams there than on Craigslist even.

Re: Finding the perfect house using open data

#23

Post by ldng »

Hovertruck wrote: post #17
cjoh wrote: post #2

The biggest users of the open data movement are, in fact, real estate professionals. It's companies like Trulia and Estately and Zillow and what not that are actually taking open data from government and putting it to good use. It'd be interesting to see some kind of startup come out of this. Though it's fairly hands-on, real estate is still a fairly hands on market, and with real estate lobbying being what it is, it…

I know it's anecdotal, but most realtors I have met actively dislike Trulia/Zillow/etc

For those not in the states nor in the trade, could you elaborate on why realtors dislike Trulia and the likes ?

Re: Finding the perfect house using open data

#24

Post by Caged »

Jemaclus wrote: post #19

I work in online real estate, and this is exactly the kind of thing we love to do when it comes to utilizing data. How can we take X, Y and Z data points and generate something useful? Taking into account crime reports, graffiti reports, available parking spaces, etc, can all help you decide whether this place is good or not. The requirements here are kinda strange (proximity to a grocery store? not crime rates or an…

> The requirements here are kinda strange (proximity to a grocery store? not crime rates or anything like that?), but to each his own, I suppose.

You're right. I've been working with open data in the Portland area for years now [1][2][3][4] and have a lot of built up internal knowledge of the neighborhoods and locations so I chose not to muddy the map with those things.

1: https://github.com/Caged/portlandcrime 2: https://github.com/caged/portland-atlas#examples 3: https://github.com/Caged/portland-census 4: http://labratrevenge.com/pdx

Re: Finding the perfect house using open data

#25

Post by enjo »

Jemaclus wrote: post #19

I work in online real estate, and this is exactly the kind of thing we love to do when it comes to utilizing data. How can we take X, Y and Z data points and generate something useful? Taking into account crime reports, graffiti reports, available parking spaces, etc, can all help you decide whether this place is good or not. The requirements here are kinda strange (proximity to a grocery store? not crime rates or an…

I'm in the midst of a pretty similar house-hunt to this guy here in Denver. I currently live Downtown and love it. I'm not willing to move outside of the city, so we're focusing on a proper house in one of the city-center neighborhoods.

Proximity to a grocery store is absolutely at the top of my list. I like to buy my food as fresh as possible and generally only buy for the meal I'm cooking that night. So having not only a grocery store, but a high-quality one, near me is incredibly important. The difference of even a block or two is huge when it comes to something you want to walk to on a very regular basis.

Sure I pay attention to things like the crime rate, but in most cities it's a nearly meaningless stat. The actual chances of being involved in a crime are very low in any neighborhood in my city (and this is true of almost every city in the U.S.). I think this is true of people predisposed to urban living. We're simply willing to tolerate a bit of crime risk in exchange for everything else that goes along with it.

From a technology point of view, I imagine it makes online real-estate very difficult to optimize for. There are so many different priorities that people have that you have to find ways to build general data-mining tools that are still actually usable by most folks. That's a tough challenge, one I don't think anyone has come close to cracking. For instance walk scores seem to be the closest to what I want and they tell you virtually nothing. Don't get me started on how we "rank" schools too:)

Re: Finding the perfect house using open data

#26

Post by Jemaclus »

pdx wrote: post #20
Jemaclus wrote: post #19

I work in online real estate, and this is exactly the kind of thing we love to do when it comes to utilizing data. How can we take X, Y and Z data points and generate something useful? Taking into account crime reports, graffiti reports, available parking spaces, etc, can all help you decide whether this place is good or not. The requirements here are kinda strange (proximity to a grocery store? not crime rates or an…

> (proximity to a grocery store? not crime rates or anything > like that?), but to each his own, Some people are not able to, or do not wish to drive every time they want something to eat. Proximity to a grocery store sounds like a good metric. It's the european model of shopping every day for that days meal, vs the U.S. model of stocking up at Costco.

True. I was more remarking on the fact that the grocery store metric seemed to be the primary one, as opposed to just one of a great many. It's definitely the kind of thing I would consider, but I'd also consider more things like price per square foot, number of bedrooms, neighborhood quality, distance to schools, etc. That's why I said "kinda strange" and not something harsher.

Re: Finding the perfect house using open data

#27

Post by Jemaclus »

Caged wrote: post #24
Jemaclus wrote: post #19

I work in online real estate, and this is exactly the kind of thing we love to do when it comes to utilizing data. How can we take X, Y and Z data points and generate something useful? Taking into account crime reports, graffiti reports, available parking spaces, etc, can all help you decide whether this place is good or not. The requirements here are kinda strange (proximity to a grocery store? not crime rates or an…

> The requirements here are kinda strange (proximity to a grocery store? not crime rates or anything like that?), but to each his own, I suppose. You're right. I've been working with open data in the Portland area for years now [1][2][3][4] and have a lot of built up internal knowledge of the neighborhoods and locations so I chose not to muddy the map with those things. 1: https://github.com/Caged/portlandcrime 2: ht…

Cool. I kinda figured that was the case. :)

Re: Finding the perfect house using open data

#29

Post by Domenic_S »

smacktoward wrote: post #21
Hovertruck wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know it's anecdotal, but most realtors I have met actively dislike Trulia/Zillow/etc

That's right, because they generally have their own proprietary source of data ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_listing_service ), which is a big part of the appeal of working with a realtor -- they learn of new listings faster than you can by relying on public, "open source" data. And realtors aren't stupid; they noticed what happened when other professions that were built on closed data opened their database…

> The current state of affairs appears to be that it does eventually flow out to them, but with a significant (1 week+) delay

I don't think that's true, at least not for Redfin. According to them:

"Homes on the MLS show up on Redfin in 30 minutes or less." - http://forums.redfin.com/t5/Inland-Empire/How-quickly-does-M...

"Local brokerage sites like Redfin show homes for sale immediately, as opposed to the seven to nine day delay typical for the national portals." - http://blog.redfin.com/blog/2013/03/you-deserve-to-see-it-al...

"Updates every 15-30 minutes" - http://www.redfin.com/about/data-quality-on-redfin

The biggest advantage of a local (real human) broker is they know what's about to go up for sale, have detailed neighborhood info, can help grease the wheels of your deal, etc. If they're good.

Re: Finding the perfect house using open data

#30

Post by npsimons »

smacktoward wrote: post #21
Hovertruck wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know it's anecdotal, but most realtors I have met actively dislike Trulia/Zillow/etc

That's right, because they generally have their own proprietary source of data ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_listing_service ), which is a big part of the appeal of working with a realtor -- they learn of new listings faster than you can by relying on public, "open source" data. And realtors aren't stupid; they noticed what happened when other professions that were built on closed data opened their database…

So basically, you're saying the real estate agents are just the next casualty from the collateral damage that is the elimination of friction in society, and they are doing what they can to remain as middlemen.
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