Anyone done websites for realtors? (integration with listing services, etc.)

Business
1

Hey everyone,

I met a woman about a year ago and she called me again today. She is a realtor and has been working with a specialty firm that provides cookie-cutter websites with all kind of crazy functionality (ability to view lists of homes for sale in your area, ability to get daily e-mail notifications of new homes for sale in your area, changes, etc.)

However, that company has been treating her horribly and she’s hoping I can do something to help her out instead. There’s no way I can replicate the features they provide in any sort of cost effective way (they built them and have many many clients all using the same software and paying monthly) but I’m hoping to at least point her in the right direction (and maybe make some money in the process, if there are boxed tools we can license that will do the same thing…)

Does anyone have any experience in this area or in using any tools that realtors might want to have on their website? Anyone have any ideas?

I appreciate any help you can give!

Thanks,

Dave

2

Dave,

There are a few open source solutions open realty is quite a popular one.

http://www.open-realty.org/

What features does she need?

Let me know if you need any futher help.

Will

3

Dave,

Open realty and other scripts (of which there are plenty) make it easy to setup a website to list an agents listings…the challenge comes when you also want to integrate data from other sources - or share your data w/other sources.

I don’t know enough to help you out with this, but you might want to poke around at http://www.realestatewebmasters.com/real-estate-and-web-design.html to see if you can find what you’re looking for - or google to find a company comparable to the one this client of yours was working with (but dislikes) and see if they can offer you a solution you can resell or maybe rebrand as your own.

Steve

4

Very difficult industry to work with. You can do well, but you’ll need to do your homework first so be careful!