Online Real Estate/Property Search:Making us smarter

"The notion that the world's knowledge is literally at your fingertips is very compelling and is very beguiling."
--Vint Cerf, Internet pioneer

Terabytes of easily accessed data, always-on Internet connectivity, and lightning-fast search engines are profoundly changing the way people gather information. A decade back, information could be sourced through newspapers, magazines, books. A lot of it was 'Word of Mouth'. Searching for relevant information was not only difficult but also cumbersome. Internet has brought it all under one roof and technology has made it searchable. Hours of work reduced to seconds, just at the click of a button.

The ease is extended to real estate search. Unlike earlier, house searching is no longer a tedious task and online portals offer the convenience of browsing properties anytime, anywhere. In fact, a lot of information flow in the space is being facilitated by online portals. The Broker and Builder community have adapted and realized the potential of the medium and a plethora of sites have come up to cater to their needs. Indicative of the pace with which they are growing is, that barely two years old in the country, sites like www.99acres.com have over 2 lakh residential and commercial properties listed on the site. Consequently, Internet is emerging as one of the most relevant, trusted and easily accessible source of information.

It is however important to know the right source and how to optimally use information available online on Real Estate.

Through real estate portals like www.99acres.com, one can buy, rent, sell and much more. One may search property on budget, type and location, and further refine search based on requirement. The sites provide complete contact details of brokers and builders. Builders also post a virtual walk through and complete description of the property on the site. Therefore, the initial search may be done online before getting on the ground. One may also set an alert for properties and sit back and relax, while the portals send regular alerts on the property updates on the site. After shortlisting, you may find it judicious to surf the website of the builder and get a fair idea on the properties and thereby doubly ensure safe investment

With extensive reach, real estate portals are a convenient medium to showcase your property to the world. Advertising on the medium is not only cost effective but measurable as well. Posting property details on the site for a year comes at a cost of one full page print ad in the newspaper and therefore the medium is very cost effective. Besides it also ensures targeted reach. When displaying a property on the website, the user gets to see just the kind of information that he is looking for and therefore it helps in eliminating unnecessary inquiries. One may also be able to eliminate the middleman fee in the process.

You may also advertise on listing websites for space available for commercial rent out on Yellow Pages sites like yellowpages.co.in, Indialist.com. Post in detail about your property on a blog. One can host a free Blog on Blogger, Type Pad or Word Press. So, get your mouse rolling and fingers ticking to bringing the customer to your doorstep.

Another important aspect of real estate investment is finance. Investment is all about judicious risk taking. With information at fingertips one may minimise the risk by researching the net carefully.

Investigate property rates: Check out the recent developments in real estate on news websites like indianrealtynews.com. Search for news specific to the city you are keen on investing in. Refer to research reports of Cushman and Wakefield, Jones Lang La Salle etc. 99acres.com, host a section on reports on property rates in various cities as published by Cushman and Wakefield.

Check the location on Wikimapia and Google Maps: these sites provide a satellite view of a city. One can log on to the sites and take a virtual look at a city. The sites give a fair idea on location of a property, routes and connectivity. In their nascent stage, these sites are sure to evolve to become a Mecca for routes and maps and locations.

Find about Home loans and interest rates: Sites like Loanwala.com and Apnaloan.com give exhaustive information on Home Finance. These sites breakdown each of the different parameters you should be considering while taking a home loan, into the minutest detail. Home Finance information is also available on real estate and property sites. One may also browse through websites of banks like ICICI and HDFC that have evolved overtime and can get genuine information as well as apply for loans through their site.

Another useful new age tool is RSS and XML readers. For regular news updates subscribe to e-newsletters and RSS feeds on real estate from Economic Times, Indianrealtynews.com etc. RSS feeds automatically updates the reader as soon as there is an update on the site subscribed to. RSS reader software is available online and can be easily setup on the computer. One may also create an online account with Google reader.

To summarize it all, you can research and get advice through real estate experts through reports released by them, get advise on finance and get news updates by being active as well as subscribing to the right sites.

The information on the net is easily searchable and downloadable and new age tools bring them straight to a desktop. As internet penetrates, it is sure to transform the information sharing and communication landscape and to be competitive one must be on the internet edge at all times.

by Aakriti Bhargav