The 9 Most Significant Real Estate Tech/Marketing Moments of 2009

2009 was one hell of a year for the real estate industry. We saw an $8,000 first time buyer tax credit come and almost leave before pulling a fast one and occupying our guest bedroom for another 6 months.

The mortgage industry, always a bit of a rocky boat, even went through a few extra spin cycles with FHA changes and the introduction of the HVCC. With enough market drama to keep six Mamas busy it’s easy to accidentally overlook nine of the most significant real estate tech and marketing moments from 2009.

Fortunately, we’ve got them all here:

1. RPR - Nothing has set the real estate industry on fire this year quite like the introduction of the RPR and its sister site, HouseLogic. RPR (REALTORs Property Resource) is the spawn of NAR acquisitions and licensing agreements that will give REALTORs access to a national database of property information including public records, details of prior transactions and much more.

Rob Hahn predicts death reinvention. Brian Boero of 1000watt Consulting thinks there will be some wins and some losses to go around in the post-RPR world.

2. NAR rules Google is not a scraper site, allows indexable IDX search results. - When Google indexes your IDX search results, you win. You win if you have an indexable IDX on your site because if a local home buyer drives by a home, writes down the address and Googles it your website will be in the search results waiting to give that buyer more information about the home.

One particular local board of REALTORs (MIBOR) was up in arms about this practice and received the blessing from NAR to go after one of their own members to prevent listings from being indexed by Google in the Spring of 2009. A recent IDX policy change by NAR in November 2009 works to amend this decision by switching sides and no longer referring to Google as a ’scraper site’.

3. iPhone fever starts infecting real estate brokerages. - Redfin, Corcoran Group and ZipRealty all released ground breaking iPhone real estate search apps in 2009. I think markets like Manhattan (where Corcoran Group is based and there is no MLS) will benefit most from an iPhone search app because each brokerage represents exclusive listings.

It remains to be seen whether Redfin and ZipRealty’s iPhone apps have a big impact on their businesses or ended up targeting the wrong end user altogether.

4. Google (re-)enters real estate listing search in a big way. - Ah, Google. We wondered why you were so eager to spend money building out StreetView, Perspective Imagery and integrating Google Base into Google Maps. Now we know: Google is creating individual listing pages for all properties submitted to Google Base. See an example here.

This has the potential to dramatically alter the real estate search engine landscape. Google already has 72.11% of U.S. general search market share which is undoubtedly responsible for sending a large portion of web traffic to places like Trulia, Homes.com and Zillow. How will Google’s next move into real estate affect these sites?

5. REW announces a framable IDX solution. - Real Estate Webmasters, long known for their high end real estate website design and indexable IDX solution, has been quietly preparing a rollout of their first framable real estate search (aka IDX) which will debut in January 2010.

The IDX market has been pretty stagnant lately so agents and brokers will really benefit from a key quality player joining the game. You can see a demo of the new REW IDX by visiting http://www.rewidx.com/.

6. Coldwell Banker attempts to redefine search with BlueScape. – Coldwell Banker worked on ending 2009 with a bang by introducing their new beta search called “Bluescape”. Rob Hahn offers deep insight into the user experience of BlueScape while criticizing the search as being a “half-baked solution in search of a problem”. The rest of Rob’s article is well worth reading when you have 15-30 minutes to take it all in.

7. “If You Want To Close More Deals, Force Registration!” - A straight forward suggestion by Eric Bramlett (disclosure: Eric is an editor and content advisor for Online Real Estate 101) on BloodhoudBlog to force registration on real estate website searches to close more deals broke out into a discussion of business ethics. Both sides (pro-forced registration vs. anti-forced registration) argued fervently but registration and conversion rate numbers do support the idea of forcing website visitors to register to view listing details.

8. Century 21 kills national TV ads in favor of online marketing. - Almost immediately after the new year began in 2009 Century 21 dropped a marketing bombshell. The Realogy brand announced that they would no longer run national tv ads and will, instead, reallocate that budget to online marketing efforts like display ads and pay per click marketing.

To most internet marketing junkies this was a “took long enough!” announcement but the implications this shift has for other national franchises is significant.

9. REBarCamp goes virtual, becomes huge success. - First there was REBarCamp, an in-person “unconference” that allowed anyone with a story to tell or topic to teach to stand in front of the masses and give it their best shot.

Harnessing the power of virtual technology, Jim Cronin, creator of Real Estate Tomato, helped lead the way to the first ever virtual REBarCamp. The first Virtual REBarCamp (#vrebc on Twitter) attendance exceeded expectations by nearly 100% to nearly 2,000 users so a second VREBC was set in motion. The next VREBC will be January 4, 2010 from 9:00 am – 4:00 pm PST. Click here to learn more or register for Virtual REBarCamp II.

RPR, forced registration and indexable IDX search results have caused quite a stir over the last year. What’s your take on the mega events of 2009? Do you support forced registration to view real estate listings?

Photo Credit: schmilblick