The Canadian Real Estate Association’s (www.realtor.ca) multiple listing service (MLS) remains the largest online real estate listing system in Canada, but B.C. realtors can now access the most advanced data delivery platforms in the country.
Available so far only in B.C., the services recently launched by New Westminster-based Landcor Data and Vancouver’s HQ Real Estate Services take real estate information delivery to a whole new level.
Landcor’s (www.landcor.com) is not a listing service but a market research tool, according to company founder and president Rudy Nielsen. Landcor purports to have the province’s deepest and most sophisticated real estate information. Its database, for example, includes sales and permit history on all 1,912,211 titles in B.C., and it updates between 3,000 and 8,000 Land Title Office transactions every week.
The system tracks every commercial and residential real estate transaction in the province, including private sales, family transfers, strata deals and new developments, as well as those on MLS. The assessments go back as far as 1991, and sales data to 1972, which is unique to Landcor.
Also unique to its system is the ability to see lot boundary lines, which allows a realtor with an iPad or iPhone to find boundary markers while on a wooded acre in the Cariboo or building lot in downtown Nanaimo.
The system’s search engine can find properties by address, identification number, legal description or even GPS.
“This type of access to so much information is something that has never been available in the past,” Nielsen said.
Major banks, credit unions, mortgage insurers, large investors and other parties have long mined Landcor’s data.
Realtors can now access the same data and use a custom search engine that will locate properties by virtually any variable, from the assessed value to square footage to whether it has a view or a swimming pool.
The monthly subscription cost for residential realtors ranges from $15 for 30 property searches and reports to $20 for 50 properties, or virtually unlimited reports for $30. The service is not available to the general public.
Nielsen said the entire system will be updated every quarter with new features, which are automatically added at no charge for subscribers.
He pointed out that a realtor could view the 10 most recent sales in an area, tour the subject property and its environs through the Microsoft BING mapping system, see property assessments and even get an evaluation report that suggests an uncannily accurate listing price on the property.
Landcor system also tracks all new development sales, which are normally not publicly released.
“It turns any realtor into an instant expert on any property or area in the province,” Nielsen said.
Nielsen said Landcor plans to launch a similar service for commercial realtors that will add some specific features.
For example, a commercial realtor could sit with a client in Hong Kong and find every vacant retail-zoned lot in Kelowna along with recent sales and price information on the entire market.
“That realtor would know more about the Okanagan market than an Okanagan realtor.”
Nielsen added that realtors are quickly falling into two camps: those with instant access to the hottest information and those without. The latter, he said, are in trouble.
HQ Real Estate Services
What started as a recruitment campaign and lead generator has evolved into perhaps the most sophisticated online commercial and residential listing service in B.C.
HQ Real Estate Services teamed up with Eco Realty Inc. in creating www.ecorealty.ca, which it launched this year with Grant Wilson, a former realtor and now CEO of Eco Realty. The free, open-access service covers residential and commercial listings with an elegant and powerful search engine.
“People want to see listings, not flash,” said HQ’s CEO David England.
The MLS system used by most real estate companies includes a voluntary reciprocity program that allows listing information to be shared with other companies. Eco Realty’s web page takes that further, including both MLS and exclusive listings from its realtors and other companies.
The businesses operate out of two Vancouver locations with 47 brokers, including such well-known names as apartment brokers David and Mark Goodman.
The premise is simple: post lots of listings and generate leads from the online response at www.ecorealtyinc.ca.
The listings make as much information as possible available to online search engines, while inquiries from prospective clients are routed to the responsible HQ broker.
The system has some geographical limitations: HQ so far covers the Lower Mainland and Whistler, but does not include Vancouver Island or Interior listings. Wilson, who has an aptitude for software development, knows buyers are looking for properties, not realtors, when they go online. But the software underpinning Eco Realty ensures customers reach the brokers who can handle them with less hassle. That speeds deal velocity.
“What we’re trying to do is lower our conversion ratio,” Wilson explained. “We’re now down to about 68 [visits per lead], and we think we can get it down to about 55 visits for one lead.”
The site currently generates about 300 leads per month for HQ brokers.
It also features a feed of new listings, which is what people are looking for after they’ve gone through the existing inventory.
With more than 2,000 visitors a day spending an average of 10 minutes on Eco Realty’s site, and each visitor viewing about 18 listings per visit, the site excites consultants such as Ben Nyland, president of Rampworth Capital Services Inc. in North Vancouver.
Nyland helped develop financial projections for Eco Realty and created the pitch England and Wilson made to the venture’s initial investors, who have since anted up $2 million.
“It’s a very promising company,” Nyland said. “They’re going to change the way commercial real estate is done in Vancouver.”
While most franchise real estate companies place tight control on information, England and Wilson’s mantra is to put everything up online and work in co-operation.
“What Eco Realty and HQ are bringing is a really solid understanding both of how the web works, in terms of how people are searching, as well as ... how the real estate industry works,” Nyland said. “They’re doing a great job of bringing the two together in a way that just naturally fits with the way people want to find real estate and do business.”
The site is already wired into social media, so listings can be monitored or added on the fly.
“This is the future of real estate,” England said, “The old franchise model is dead.”