Comments on: Four Types of Property Portal Markets

By: Going Global - Acquisition Driven Growth | My CEO Life

Going Global - Acquisition Driven Growth | My CEO Life — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 02:33:58 +0000

[...] (e.g. the traffic to the Australian site) or where the market structure was early stage. (See Analysis – Four Types of Property Portal Markets on our sister site – [...]

By: Mobile Phones and Property Portals - Are They a Match? | Property Portal Watch

Tue, 16 Sep 2008 04:33:03 +0000

[...] and foremost, we need to look at market itself. In the maturing markets (See previous article), consumers already have established a habit in which they will search for real estate – the PC. [...]

By: Simon Baker

Simon Baker — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 08:43:40 +0000

Femi

Thanks for your question regarding non-existent markets. I do take on board you comments regarding these markets and the emergence of the internet in them. However, the gap between the emergence of the internet and the ongoing use by real estate agents to advertise property will probably be a large one.

Therefore in the non-existent markets, any portal site will take a long time to make progress however the good news is that you have a chance to define how the market is likely to work. I would start with a pay for use model (like a subscription model) and then invest time into creating awareness of the market with both agents (to build content) and consumers.

This will be a game of patience but in the long term may be worth it.

Thanks

Simon Baker
Publisher
Property Portal Watch

By: Drew Izzo from Roost.com

Drew Izzo from Roost.com — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 20:06:38 +0000

In response to your inclusion of Trulia and Zillow as aspirants in the emerging market category, I wanted to point you to a WAV Group study on the accuracy of real estate search sites. You can find more details on the study at http://www.roost.com, but the basic finding was that aggregator sites like Trulia and Zillow deliver for sale listing accuracy rates as low as 8 percent. Their business model is to gather information on homes for sale from various and possibly random sources, causing homeseekers to waste time sifting through inaccurate data. Roost gets its info directly from local MLSs, and consistently delivers accuracy rates of 96-98 percent.

By: Ed

Ed — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 11:26:18 +0000

Just curious but where do you see the free or near free players like Craigslist and Gumtree playing into this? By many metrics they are bigger than the big guys, and dominate certain geographies and segments (rentals, flatshares).

By: Business blog » Blog Archive » Analysis - Four Types of Property Portal Markets

Mon, 08 Sep 2008 04:57:50 +0000

[...] Read the rest of this great post here [...]

By: Badmus Oluwafemi

Badmus Oluwafemi — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 19:10:16 +0000

I’m a co-founder of a new property portal in Nigeria, the site is currently under construction. Your comment about the African market is very correct and truly there is no market yet. But i will like to give you an insight about the recent developments in Nigeria that might give way to the emergence of a viable property portal market. Recent reforms in the Banking industry have given rise to profitable mergers which in turn gave birth to very strong financial institutions compared to what is obtainable in the past. These Banks due to the volume of shareholders funds at their disposal are making massive investments in the various sectors of the economy one of which is the Real estate aspect. The awareness about the gold mine buried in the Real estate business is growing by the day. Various Mortgage institutions most of them baby companies of theses banks are rolling out various packages to entice the populace. Now the problem that i see in my line of sight is that of the level internet usage in the country.
1 Most people would rather not conduct any business online due to to fraudulent cases.
2 The no of internet users in Nigeria is still relatively low
3 Most people are not yet well educated about Mortgage practices and the importance of the real estate sector .But despite theses problems i think there should be a property portal in this country. You said there is no market well, we’re just gonna go ahead and create one.The recent investments in the Telecommunication in the country has boosted the figure of internet users overnight. I believe what we have to do is a series of educative and sensitization process in the country about the importance of online real estate marketing. The boom being experienced in our real estate market is too profitable that it will be a shame if there is no property portal site to back it up. I am open to comments and advice on how to go about this .

By: Andy

Andy — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 13:39:11 +0000

Thank you for great informations!

Just correct spanish portals extension – it is .es, not .sp.

fotocasa.es, idealista.es

By: femi t.

femi t. — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 13:30:42 +0000

Great post, but what happened to the non existent markets, at least the maturing markets were once non-existent,I would like to know what strategy can the non-existent markets take to become an early stage market. Thank you.

By: Femi T.

Femi T. — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 12:37:43 +0000

Very informative post there, but what about the non-existent markets? At least the maturing markets were once non-existent, so I would love to see a review of what the non-existent markets can do to get to at least the early stage markets.
Because the web presence in this part of the world is increasing.
Thank you