Real Estate and the Mapping Arms Race

The online mapping arms race couldn't have come at a better time for real estate. As property markets cool off, and those in the business look for new ways to impress clients, Microsoft and Google keep one-upping each other with free applications that look good on home pages. Want to target property buyers who love the Austin, Texas music scene? Try creating a map/video mashup of hot performance venues in residential areas. Far-fetched ideas like that can see the light of day at little or no cost, and potentially help Realtors gain a foothold in new markets, thanks to mapping's new accessibility.

Real Estate Webmasters forum member Roldan Aquino has the latest real estate mashup hotspot at Gootube.net. Copping the nickname for post-YouTube Google, Gootube allows Realtors to submit their listings on a Google Map for free. Here's Aquino's thread on REW.

To take it one step further, consider real estate's impact on mapping. Over the past six months we've seen how important the industry is to Microsoft, as some of the nation's largest brokerages become key clients of Microsoft Virtual Earth. It's also hard not to read into the 3-D billboard advertising in Virtual Earth, which primarily features real estate companies, including Zip Realty, and Seattle-based brokerage John L. Scott. Google reached real estate eminence just before Microsoft, with its acquisition of YouTube in Oct. 2006. As Gootube illustrates, the new mashup empire has become an ideal neighborhood for Realtors and their listings.

Mappers and real estate companies have a close and public relationship these days. John L. Scott VP of Marketing and Business John Chang says his company consults regularly with Microsoft on Virtual Earth.

"We're in the same city, so we can drive over and have a sit down meeting with them. I've had the opportunity to go out to Microsoft and speak to their mapping team on several occasions."

In late 2006 John L. Scott made a splash with its website redesign, becoming the first real estate company to use Virtual Earth maps for its listings. Since then Chang says total site traffic has improved by 25 per cent, while return visits have risen 47 per cent.

Microsoft is also in regular development talks with online listings pioneer Redfin, another big Seattle-based company that switched to Virtual Earth in early 2007, and coined the recent months.

"I'm on the road every day. We're able to get feedback on a regular basis because of the close proximity," says Ken Miller, North American Sales Manager for Microsoft Virtual Earth.

Neither side will elaborate on exactly what gets discussed at these meetings, but Miller is keen to list some of the features coming for Virtual Earth. These include rooftop geocoding, with 400,000 square miles of photos recently added to the Virtual Earth library, improvements to Virtual Earth's popular Bird's Eye imagery, and more 3-D buildings and landmarks in cities.

"I think ultimately we're going to get to a true sense of what it's like to be in a place," says Miller.

Microsoft has manufactured a buzz for Virtual Earth, but it has a long way to go before it can displace Google and Yahoo in real estate mapping. The search engine giants enjoyed a long honeymoon with web-savvy Realtors after launching their products in early 2005, and 2002, respectively. Anyone who's spent a few minutes clicking on search engine results for real estate has likely seen how pervasive the older platforms are.

As Virtual Earth catches on, it'll be interesting to see what users pick as its biggest shortcomings. One hang-up a lot of people have is that Virtual Earth won't display 3-D results in Firefox. But at least it runs as one platform in Internet Explorer, as opposed to Google Maps and Google Earth, which run separately.

It's clear, given Microsoft's appetite for real estate clients, and Google's rush to integrate video, that home listings and new map features will remain joined at the hip for the time being. But it's going to be a while before we see who wins the battle to display those listings.

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