Hello all. I am trying to help my dear Mother (im 19, shes...a bit older) get her real estate website running. She has been a realtor in the Washington DC area (DC, VA, MD) for about 5 years.

I just wanted to get opinions from WHT'ers about what they would like to see on a real estate website. Links to houses for sales, database searches, current listings, partners, mission statement, and the like. Anything you can think of that I can possibly do to help my Mother with her website would be greatly appreciated.

I was also wondering if anyone knew of any good realtor websites. Ones that are interactive and fun to visit, yet informative and to the point as well.

In the end I plan to employ someone to design a website (including all scripts and coding) for this project based on responses here and on other sites.

This is not a place for people to tell me to hire them, I simply want ideas regarding real estate and realtor websites.

Thanks to anyone that helps!:homer:

Well, here are some tips. I would keep the colors eye pleasing (maybe neutral colors) - Of course it needs to be really clean and professional. As far as pages, normally with any real estate site, it's a hompage, about us, search houses, Marketing & Sales information (like info telling how the process is for the buyers and sellers, etc..) and of course, a contact page with a form so people can contact her... hope this helps but I think you have the general idea...

I don't care what the page looks like... I want to see pictures! Lots of pictures.... floor plans.... and videos would be great.... I want information!

I was looking for a house the other night, and you would be surprised how many people leave off the Sq Foot information. I'm like, huh?

Lot of good sites around... google it.. lol

http://open-realty.com/

That is a solid script that I highly recomend. Very active forums there too full of people to help answer your questions about it.

I don't care what the page looks like... I want to see pictures! Lots of pictures.... floor plans.... and videos would be great.... I want information!

I was looking for a house the other night, and you would be surprised how many people leave off the Sq Foot information. I'm like, huh?

Lot of good sites around... google it.. lol

Pictures would be there, videos can be added. Thats a good idea. As much detail as possible, even the smallest things. Thanks :)



http://open-realty.com/

That is a solid script that I highly recomend. Very active forums there too full of people to help answer your questions about it.

Looks pretty good. I gave it a 1 minute look around because I am rushing a bit right now. Thanks for the link though, and I will take a closer look at it when I get home later on.

Thanks!

Anyone else with suggestions?

Well, here are some tips. I would keep the colors eye pleasing (maybe neutral colors) - Of course it needs to be really clean and professional. As far as pages, normally with any real estate site, it's a hompage, about us, search houses, Marketing & Sales information (like info telling how the process is for the buyers and sellers, etc..) and of course, a contact page with a form so people can contact her... hope this helps but I think you have the general idea...

Sorry, missed your response before. I have the basics down, infact she has a website up that I can show anyone that is interested. I dont really want to post the link here, but if you want to see it, feel free to PM me. I just want to help her make the site more dynamic and user friendly.

Thanks again :)

anyone else please?

if you're going to be doing it don't set yourself too much to do because it's your mum and you want to please her.

be realistic.

Check with her local MLS office, I did a site for a local realtor and they were helpful in getting me access to listings all over the region for my client's site. His site now downloads pics and info for regional listings nightly right from their database with a short and sweet cron script. :)

Easy to navigate.
Always updated.
Decent MLS script.

Moved to Web Design and Content. Because it's a discussion about web design and content.

ohh,didnt even know this existed. Thanks for all the feedback, anyone else have opinions?

what kind of setup/features are you hoping to accomplish with this project

IDX integration?
personal listings?
buyer/seller articles?
Virtual tour integration?
listing flyer generators?
mortgage calc?
about page?
lead management?

Have a script to automaticaly make posts in free RE classifieds (such as craigslit.org) So whenever she puts up a house in her admin to show on her website, it will be automatically posted on cragislist or any other free or low cost classifieds website. With a link to the acutal listing on her website (where allowed).

what kind of setup/features are you hoping to accomplish with this project

IDX integration?
personal listings?
buyer/seller articles?
Virtual tour integration?
listing flyer generators?
mortgage calc?
about page?
lead management?

All sound good, but I dont know what IDX is. I dont know programming at all, so I dont know the scope or limit that a script can do in terms of connecting to MLS, and using their database and such.

Personal listings would be good, houses that she is selling need to be on the website.
Articles would be nice, but it'd be great if there was a way to automatically link to those articles taht are posted on another site.
Virtual tours would be good, and just requires posting videos and pictures and such online correct?
Flyer generators? I'm not quite sure what you mean by this.
Mortgage calc depends on a lot of things..and many of these things require a bank and loan officer to find out, so I am not quite sure how to get a dynamic mortgage calc.
About page -definately
Lead managment would be great But what kind of script would you create a script for that?


Have a script to automaticaly make posts in free RE classifieds (such as craigslit.org) So whenever she puts up a house in her admin to show on her website, it will be automatically posted on cragislist or any other free or low cost classifieds website. With a link to the acutal listing on her website (where allowed).
That seems like a good idea, Know of any free scripts like that? or should i add that to the design list?

Open Realty is a bad choice if you plan to do IDX integration, especially in a large market.

There are a multitude of IDX Vendors. I run IDXHELP.com for example.

Also check out another forum.... http://www.realestatewebmasters.com/forum.php

I'm an agent so I can say this... most agents, myself included are cheap. You don't have to go for a full on (high dollar) real expensive website to get an effective one ... but try to steer your mom away from the stock templates offered by the real estate web companies.

Register a website with her own domain name, don't use a subdomain off the offices web domain; but do create a page pointing to your mom's website off of the offices website.

Most everyone will agree... lots of pictures. People look for real estate websites to see pictures of homes. All of the different boards of realtors are different with regards to rules and displaying listings as well as the IDX. I have a separate vendor for my MLS Homesearch. (IDX is the MLS online)

Just getting a real estate website to have one isn't going to do anybody but the web company any good. Once you get the website up, promote it.

Just my thoughts.