A Few Thoughts on RealEstate.com

As a skeptic that millennials need another portal, I said I’d withhold judgement until I saw the product. Yesterday, I had a few minutes to take a look at the new RealEstate.com.

It seems the main differentiator is searching by cost. An “All-In Monthly Pricing” module is shown on all property detail pages:

As a millennial who hasn’t bought a home yet, I do see value in a clear cost breakdown like this (as long as its accurate).

Part of the simplified search is the ability to search by budget, which factors in down payment and your monthly budget. I like that feature, but I’m not sure it’s enough by itself to draw a millennial home buyer audience.

Aside from that, the portal seems like just another barebones IDX search site. I think my gut is correct; the long term goal of the portal is to own another piece of organic SEO real estate for “city + real estate / city + homes for sale” terms across the country (which would otherwise be controlled by brokerages). With their in house marketing team and broad portfolio of domains with major SEO power/history, they obviously hold a significant advantage when it comes to climbing the rankings fairly quickly.

As a millennial, I still find “Zillow” to be a much cooler/sexier brand than realestate.com. Maybe that’s just me.

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