There are a host of web-based real estate tools out there for anyone looking to acquire, revalue, or manage their properties. What I see out there is that because of the last few years being dominated by moving of single family homes, almost all of these tools are geared for the buyers with that intention.
However, there has to have been some thought put into these online services that allows for them to be easily used by those of us who are in the business of finding, acquiring, and reassessing rental housing. Hm.
Neighboroo.
The apparent purpose of
Neighboroo is to throw up some nice regional statistics such as
Crime (they apply their own weighting system to this, giving more weight to "violent", versus "property" crime),
Politics, Elementary School Rankings, Cost of Living, and Median Income per zip code, on a google map of the US.
The pros:
Very simple interface, with obvious left hand navigation. The data provided is actually useful in doing some very top-level, simplified analysis for a given region. Nice, quick snapshot. Plus, this is a brand-spankin’ new company, and I’m honestly not even sure where they plan on going with this. I just happened across it while searching for similar internet sites.
The cons:
Not really deep on the data side. Sure, it goes down to zip code, you can even type a specific code in and get your results in an arrowed bubble, but many times zip code isn’t precise enough a measure when sniffing around a potential new investment area. And the “Population Density� section concerning race is a bit, well, racy for my taste. For an investor of my variety, the only color I’m ever concerned with is green. The rest is a waste of my time.
Side note: What would be REALLY cool is if there was a time-warping feature where one could see stats like these from the past. Perhaps it would help clue an investor in on income/population/rental value trends. Perhaps.
All-in-all, I’m going to chalk Neighboroo up as a “work in progress, with much promise�.
