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Trulia.com a staple in the online real estate world has now taken their easy to use web search engine to the hands of iPhone users.  The new iPhone 3g gives mobile users the ability to use location services (or simply GPS).  Trulia's new application is a easy to use interface, when paired with the new GPS capability of the iPhone allows real estate shoppers to find homes within a set radius of their current location.  Easy to use filters allows for easy filtering of Price, Bedrooms, Bathrooms, and Square Footage.  Users are then given the closest matches of properties based on their search criteria.

Trulia gathers property information in several different ways.  They have special IDX (Information Data Exchange) services in place with companies like Coldwell Banker Legacy.  Many other listings from smaller companies can also be included in the Trulia search if Realtors decide to upload their listings.  This gives a huge marketing advantage to Coldwell Banker Legacy brokers, and their clients as all the listings automatically upload to Trulia once they are active on the local MLS.  Marketing in the online arena is becoming quickly the most effective way of reaching the greatest number of buyers in any given market place.  Nearly 83% of all home buyers in 2007 used the internet at some point during their home search (NAR Buyer Profile 2007).

Trulia also gives users of the iPhone the ability to search out local open houses within their search criteria.  However, brokers need to manually upload any open house information directly to Trulia, as there is no information exchange for this feature.  So as Apple has quickly taken over the smartphone market, and an estimated 45 million iPhones will be in use by the end of 2009, brokers should utilize the services of Trulia to better compete in the online market place.

 Happy Selling

 Brandon Wells