Southwest Chicago Suburbs Not Big on Subdivisions

Active Rain is currently giving away points (it was posted that 1000 points would be given for every hyper-local content post made - up to 7000 points - 1 post a day for the next 7 days).  I still post on AR (although I stopped paying attention to points a long time ago) and try to post on both REW and AR as much as I can (I have a list of all of my blogs and go down the list for each post to make sure they're evened out).  Sometimes it comes to once a week, sometimes less. 

I Wrote a Post That I Thought Followed the Recommendation

I posted about Orland Park Homes For Sale Under $200,000.  But I was told I should have dug deeper and posted about a more local and specific neighborhood or subdivision.  In my opinion, that was a niche in itself that would attract first-time home buyers and investors to this popular village that has a higher average sales price.  $200,000 and under is the lowest price denomination in this popular village right now.

In the areas I sell in, I have never had a buyer state that they only wanted to live in one particular subdivision.  In fact, most of my buyers choose many different towns.  Some of them have to be referred out to other agents because they choose many towns that are very spread out.  We have a huge MLS and these towns can be an hour or more away.  I draw the line at a 30 minute drive that doesn't require a highway.

Point2 Agent Also Requires Subdivisions

And I've had to fight them on almost every one of my listings.  With the exception of a few homes I listed and condominiums and some townhomes, there isn't always a subdivision associated with the property.  My home town of Oak Lawn is older and established and the subdivisions of the 50's and 60's have melded into one another and there are only two newer ones that someone might recognize (and one of those is more than 15 years old). 

I can remember some of the old subdivision names (I also grew up in Oak Lawn), but I have no idea what the geographic parameters are or how many homes comprise those old subdivisions.  The bottom line is that I cannot write much about these particular subdivisions more than an approximate geographic location and possibly an idea of how old the subdivision is - if I can find a listing posted in the MLS under that subdivision name.

Of course, Point2Agent makes money on selling these subdivisions to their members, so of course they want to find as many subdivisions as possible.  Is AR thinking on similar lines?  I would never pay for a subdivision in Point2Agent or any other portal.  Even if I farmed that particular "subdivision" I would already have it in top search engine positions on my own, thank you.

My MLS Doesn't Require Subdivision Names

My own MLS doesn't make the Subdivision field mandatory and therefore few agents ever put a subdivision name in.  So even if I wanted to, I couldn't create a viable IDX snippet on my REW sites as only a fraction (if any) of homes available in a particular subdivision would appear on the IDX snippet search.  If a buyer knew that more homes were actually up for sale in these areas and my site omitted some or most of them, then they wouldn't value my site very much.

Sometimes I think I should call the villages and try to get some kind of subdivision map (if they have such a thing) and start creating pages for these different subdivisions.  But would those many hours of work pay off for me?  Again, in my area buyer clients have never asked me to buy in a specific subdivision only.  They request cities, not subdivisions.  

I'm aware of the value of long tail searches.  But to create a decent page for each and every subdivision that I could unearth just in the 3 largest villages I work in, it would take hours and hours of work and I'm just not sure it would be a worthwhile ROI for the time put in.  Sure, I might get some hits, but I question whether those hits would be actual buyers or other agents trying to figure out what I've got.  

Let me repeat, in my area buyers do not request listings based on subdivisions.  They might in your area and if you don't create a page for each subdivision you work in you'd be missing the boat.  But there are areas like the villages and towns I work in that do not focus on subdivisions or "neighborhoods."

In fact, I e-mailed AR back stating that the village of Oak Lawn is considered a neighborhood in itself by most buyers.  We simply consider it a southwest suburb of Chicago.  We do not break it down into subdivisions or neighborhoods (those of us that live here or are considering living here).  The closest parameters I've ever been given by a prospective buyer was that they want west of one of the main streets of Oak Lawn.  Sometimes it's west of Cicero, sometimes it's west of Central.  But that is not an actual neighborhood.

If Subdivisions Aren't Popular In My Area, Why Do Some Agents Put Them In?

With single family homes, the subdivisions are usually older, established and probably not as prestigious as they once were.  Some subdivisions were extremely desirable when first built as they were high-end homes at the time.  Original owners sometimes have to be brought down a notch since their once popular subdivision is now 30 years old or more and just doesn't carry the clout it once did.  And so that suburb is a distant memory to most buyers, if they ever heard of it.  

So many of the older subdivisions do not get listed in the MLS.  One town I work in, Orland Park, has some newer subdivisions and most of the sellers and active agents are aware of the subdivision name so those do get listed in the MLS.  Some subdivisions in Orland Park have entrances with the subdivision name prominently posted on a sign or structure.  Some of these subdivisions have only 1 or 2 entrances and exits, so it is very easy to establish where this particular subdivision starts and ends.

Condo and townhouse complexes are usually easily identifiable and those complex names are usually posted in the MLS.  However, I had to fight with Point2Agent on a townhouse listing I had where there is no complex or subdivision name.  It was a small block of townhomes that simply has no name.

Not every listing can be categorized into a named geographic area or subdivision separate from the village it is located in.  I don't understand why some of these big portals (or others) cannot understand this fact.

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