Last weekend, this Bay Area resident was shocked — shocked!!! — at how affordable homes are in the Seattle area. (This might be scant comfort to those who just moved to Seattle from, say, Boise.) To satisfy my curiosity about just how cheap real estate really is there, I (naturally) poked around a bit on Zillow for a sense of historical home values, but since Zillow’s inventory of actual listed homes is still pretty low, I needed to find an MLS-sourced site as well.

Fortuitously, Galen Ward (frequent Rain City contributor, entrepreneur, and guru on all things real estate-search related) emailed me yesterday to give me a heads-up about his brainchild Shackprices’ launch today. I thought I’d give it a test run; here’s what I found…

The site’s home page is sparse, as it should be. Having a zoomable, draggable, clickable Google-maps based search page is pretty much de rigeur these days, and Shackprices does not disappoint. That feature alone puts it way ahead of most broker and MLS sites, but does nothing to set it apart from, say, Movoto or Redfin.

Shackprices offers a nice intuitive way to refine your search: you can add criteria (like square footage, lot size, or property type) by selecting from a drop-down box, and removing criteria is also intuitive: just click the “x” next to it. Very nice, very Web 2.0.

Clicking on a home icon gives all the expected details — without requiring user registration, showing that Shackprices understands that in the Web 2.0 world, the only way you attract people is by showing that you trust them to come back without holding their email address hostage.

For each shack you examine, you can get suggestions, which show similar, nearby homes. You also get information on nearby recent solds, a clear indication that the NWMLS (of which Shackprices is a member) has finally woken up to the dangers that Zillow presents to those who would hide information as a way of maintaining control. Unfortunately, only a few comps are available per house, perhaps by design, more likely by NWMLS fiat.

Shackprices also provides the expected neighborhood information about nearby schools, parks, and shopping centers. A pleasant surprise was the link-up to Flickr (to show pictures of the area) and to 43places (whose site was unfortunately down). I’ve been dreaming for a while of a real estate/outside.in/neighboroo mashup, and Shackprices goes pretty far in providing that.

Overall, it’s a very pleasant, well-designed, intuitive, and informational site. The bigger question, as always, remains: What is their business model?

At least for now, Shackprices appears to be an agent referral site; though they’re a registered broker, they “do not employ any agents.” They make it clear that they’re not trying to replace agents either — a much-needed caveat in today’s world where agents find the bogeyman of disintermediation in almost anything online.

If they do decide to become a regular brokerage, I wonder whether they’ll have the cool factor (and discount model) to compete with Redfin, or the reach and reputation necessary to succeed as a more traditional broker. Another possibility would be to enter the admittedly crowded agent search web site provider, a la Realbird.
Here is my challenge to Galen and his crew: how about a Zillow mashup that has all solds and all listed properties on the same map? That would definitely take the real estate search wars to the next level!

Tags: Flickr, Movoto, Neighboroo, outside.in, Real estate, Realbird, Redfin, Shackprices, Zillow
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