patrick.net

I talked to a lawyer a couple years ago, and the problem with that is that the MLS "terms of service" prohibits the free flow of information. People have tried scraping MLS data and they generally get sued immediately for it.

So where can I get an automated feed of listings of houses for sale? Tell me that, and I'll be very happy to do it.

I thought about a cooperative effort where people just type in listings from their local newspapers, but it's a pain and I don't think people would do it. Then again, gasbuddy.com works.

Suggestions please! Also email me: p@patrick.net

Doesn't Zillow already have this with the "Home Q&A" section? I haven't seen people use it much, but it seems to be there.

Your "out", though, is that you would just be creating a forum to talk about a particular house. How did zillow come up with their database for every house in the U.S?
If you had unlimited disk space, you could catalogue every house in the U.S., just like zillow, but instead of bullshit like z-estimates, you would simply have a little chat forum for each property, just like many newspapers have after each story.
Is www.propertygossip.com taken? ;)

EDIT: Property Q&A on zillow? I hadn't heard of that! Is that really to talk about that specific house, or is it questions regarding realtors and listings?

The idea of the "Property Gossip" forum on this site is exactly that -- to have a little chat forum for each property. So it's all already here on patrick.net, but lacking in usability somehow.

I think what's missing is mostly what stocksjustgroup said -- a feed of data like listings for people to chat about.

But also, usability is not that great. What would get people chatting more, and make it easier to use?

How about links to data sources on the property?
A link to the MLS listing and/or multiple listings?

There needs to be more information to make a discussion about each property. If every person has to do 5-10 minutes of research on the property to make a statement, it just won't go anywhere. If the basic sniff test passes on the property (eg it seems to have something interesting about it, price is really high, or low or is in a good neighborhood) people might invest a bit more time going off site to look for additional information to contribute.

The link City/Zip code links appear to go no where useful? At least for now, maybe with more properties it would be useful. Perhaps replace those two links with the results those two links currently provide? Rather than having a seperate page, pull the data onto the gossip page.

In the Valuations section add in previous sales values? and/or current asking price?

"Gossip" about a property is most relevant when the house is for sale, or otherwise noteworthy in some way.

But starting a thread in a sub-forum is not going to generate a mass of discussion.

I will say that if there was a separate website devoted to property discussion... something with an easy to remember URL... and a little bit of luck in being picked up in a news feed or something... then it could really be a big hit, along the lines of the Zillow, even.

Imagine this headline on the front page of Yahoo... "Homeowners upset about 'Property Gossip' website".

I'll be honest in that most people that will make a comment about a house will probably have something less than positive to say about it. "Listing price too high", "bad area", "bad schools", "crappy interior", etc, and homeowners might legitimately get upset and feel that the comments could be hurting their property value (sometimes intentionally to steer interest away so the price can be lowered), and a lawsuit would most certainly reign down, even if it's fruitless. So whoever starts such a site would have to be ready for this type of legal assault, because if the site gets big, there will be such complaints.

So, Patrick, it seems like you have already had discussions with lawyers. Even the current "Property Gossip" sub-forum isn't immune if the "wrong" things get said about the wrong home/owner.

And that leads me to my second idea, somewhat related, but not entirely. That'll be in a separate thread...

pkennedy says

How about links to data sources on the property?
A link to the MLS listing and/or multiple listings?

There needs to be more information to make a discussion about each property.

I did include a link to a Google search about the property, which usually turns up all of Zillow, Redfin, etc. MLS is often not there because prohibited and Google obeys the robots.txt file which prohibits indexing. I called it "search listings for this address" but that's not very clear I guess. Also there's a map link and a link to the right county sites.

I'd make a separate website if I had a real good idea it would work, because it does take extra money and time to set it up.

I think a place for negative comments is exactly what's needed. Just getting positive comments from realtors doesn't tell you much. There does not seem to be much hazard in saying the "wrong" things. Other sites already allow it, and the commenter himself is ultimately responsible for his speech. I just have to make a good effort to respond to complaints, if I understand the Craigslist case correctly.

The real trick is getting a critical mass of comments or a data feed to begin with, so people have a reason to look or click on the city and zip code links. How can I get that critical mass, or data feed?