Baron Briefs

Note to bootstrappers: don’t sit on a new feature announcement too long or someone with much better funding will grab headlines with a similar feature.

So, rather than appearing as a quick and nimble entrepreneur, I get to appear as an “us too” and prematurely announce our new answer service, RealAnswers(TM), with a side-by-side comparison to Zillow’s new Home Q&A. That’s right. RealtyBaron quietly launched an answer service alongside our home search, RealSearch(TM), way back on January 5th. The purpose is to—you guessed it—answer questions about homes.

Here’s how it compares to Zillow’s new Home Q&A:

…pretty good if you ask me. This morning, I searched for homes with asking prices between $250,000 and $500,000 in 13 metro areas and compared the size of RealtyBaron’s RealSearchâ„¢ results with two real estate search leaders, Trulia and Propsmart. The results surprised me:

Atlanta	1,462	1,496	2,693
Boston	242	498	1,240
Chicago	2,420	10,023	9,199
Dallas	744	332	1,950
Denver	411	1,358	1,186
Vegas	5,050	3,264	3,336
L.A.	369	2,686	4,023
Miami	1,950	8,770	10,375
Phoenix	2,128	6,802	4,063
Seattle	298	3,470	751
S.D.	1,038	3,238	5,519
S.F.	75	468	1,186
D.C.	603	720	2,374
**NOTE: 15% added to Trulia numbers to account for no FSBOs in results.

Was this a scientific comparison? No, because it doesn’t consider the quality of the listing data. For example, Trulia’s or Propsmart’s search algorithms may exclude listings from their index if the listing is missing data points A, B, and/or C. As a result, the total number of their results would be lower. Regardless, it was nice to visualize how RealtyBaron’s RealSearchâ„¢ sizes up against the incumbents.

…2.7 million at last count. But if the number changes, you’ll know immediately now that our search form shows the total size of Vast’s dataset.

Today, I’m proud to announce the public beta launch of RealtyBaron’s newest product, RealSearchâ„¢. My goal was to blend a basic yet fast vertical search with decision tools to help put a search result in context for buyers–all wrapped in a clean user interface. If you have feedback for me, drop in on the search discussion group and join other beta testers in adding new dimensions to the product. Enjoy!