The Internet is a big hit in real estate circles, helping buyers pinpoint their dream homes, and providing Realtors with a steady flow of savvy clients.
By:KATHLEEN McGINN SPRING
The Internet is a big hit in real estate circles, helping buyers pinpoint
their dream homes, and providing Realtors with a steady flow of savvy clients.
"It’s extremely important," Alice Schoemann, office manager for Coldwell Banker’s
Princeton Junction office, said of the electronic marketplace and communications
tool. "It can cut time from a home search," she said, telling the story of a
client who is preparing to move to California from the Princeton area.
"He did his whole search online," Ms. Schoemann said. "He found 10 homes he
wants to see. He has printed out maps, and he knows where the houses are in
relation to his job." Central Jersey Realtors say the first stop for many home
buyers like this soon-to-be Californian is Realtor.com, a site that contains
most listings from nearly every real estate agency in the country. A prospective
buyer is asked to enter a state, and then a city and a price range.
Essential features sought in a home, such as number of bedrooms required,
can also be entered into search fields. The results generally include pictures
of the homes, community information and a map. Information on the listing agent
is included too. In addition to Realtor.com, most agencies have their own Web
sites, and increasingly, agents maintain individual sites, which may be quite
elaborate and provide links to any number of other real estate oriented sites.
"At first, some agents were concerned that the Internet would cause us to
lose control," Dotti Ridolfi, who has been selling real estate in Mercer County
for 26 years, said. "But it makes our work easier." The Internet has made buyers
much more knowledgeable, not just about available homes, but also about mortgages
and rates.
"We do less educating now," the real estate pro said. Agents and office managers
agree it is now dangerous to try to make a living selling houses without having
an Internet presence. Home buyers have taken to the relatively new medium so
much that many now inquire about homes only via e-mail and refuse to provide
phone numbers or addresses on initial inquiries. Agents who are not online stand
to miss out on this business.
Beyond dollars and sense, Realtors are taking to the Internet because it allows
them to keep in touch with their buyers – – and sellers – – at any hour without
the frustrations of phone tag. "They can ask me questions at 3 a.m." Linda Brezinski,
an agent with Prudential Fox & Roach in Princeton Junction who lives in East
Windsor, said of her clients. An insomniac’s best friend, the Internet allows
agents to keep sellers posted of progress at odd hours and ensures that an agent
will never miss out on a sale because she strayed from her phone. In just a
few years, Internet inquiries have become one of the main ways in which buyers
first make contact with Realtors. And by the time the two get together, many
potential buyers have a pretty good idea of which homes they want to see, saving
time all around.
In addition to pictures, room dimensions, lists of features and maps, the Internet
is now offering a more intimate look at homes for sale. IPIX technology provides
a virtual tour of rooms, allowing buyers to manipulate 3D images 360 degrees
for a close look into every corner. Some IPIX tours require a special download,
generally free and available right on the real estate page. Some downloads take
longer than others to install, up to 10 minutes.
The Princeton Packet Web site (www.packetonline.com) has a real estate section
with a number of virtual tours. Builders as well as Realtors have taken advantage
of this technology, and a Packet listing, Hillier’s new Pond View luxury development
(www.pondviewnj.com), offers a look at how the virtual tour works. Users can
zoom in or out and can move through rooms, getting a good idea of how windows
look, what finishing details are used and how rooms flow into one another.Some
virtual tours include outside views.
These are especially helpful in getting a feel for the home’s setting and its
neighborhood. Realtors predict that virtual tours will be included in all online
listings of luxury homes very soon. Meanwhile, a good way to find homes in central
New Jersey for which virtual tours are available is to enter the words "IPIX"
and "New Jersey" into your favorite search engine. Ms. Schoemann said the information
available on the Internet is a help in any search, but is especially useful
to move-up buyers remaining in the same general geographic area.
For newcomers, all of the maps and pictures are a good introduction, but do
not give a real feel for the differences in towns, she has found, both through
her clients and through personal experience. "I just bought a condo in Atlanta
for my son," Ms. Schoemann said, explaining that her son is attending medical
school in that city and she decided a condo would be a good investment to hold
during his years there. "I got right on the Internet, but didn’t know the area,"
she said of her search. Finding that she had no real idea of the advantages
of any one of that city’s sprawling suburbs over the others, she said: "I got
myself a really good Realtor."
Another drawback to an Internet-based search is that listings are not always
current, and Realtors report that prospective buyers sometimes come in excited
about buying a house that is under contract. Internet listings are "only as
good as the people monitoring them," Ms. Schoemann pointed out. Fearing that
a contract may fall through, Realtors tend to leave homes on the Internet until
closing, she said. In a real estate market like this one, where the most desirable
homes sell in hours rather than months, this can be a serious impediment to
picking a specific home at leisure through an Internet search.
But, all in all, the Internet is a boon, embraced enthusiastically by buyers
and sellers, and by their Realtors. And, even for window shoppers, the listings
are great fun, providing a closeup look at houses in the neighborhood as well
as in exotic, faraway locales.
Kathleen McGinn Spring is a freelance writer who often writes about the Internet.
She is the former editor of the Princeton Business Journal.