Real Estate Marketing & Beyond
Before the Trojan War started, Achilles was told he had two options: he could live inconspicuously or die a hero. He chose to die a hero. This type of Homeric drama is not present in the world of real estate mobile apps. However, the field is undergoing epic changes. In 2015, global mobile users passed desktop users and mobile usage is skyrocketing. Today’s users love mobile, and it’s not enough just to have a mobile-friendly website. The real tabasco is having a marvelous application that benefits users. This is why real estate mobile apps have a bright future.
Consumers are hungry for real estate data. Here’s an abbreviated list of stats consumers want to know: home price, prices of other homes in the area, year the house was built, square footage of the property, previous owners, permits the home has, home appreciation, crime rates in the area, local schools, local police and fire departments, and much more besides this. Right now, no application has all the data that consumers are interested in. The potentate in the current market is Zillow. Yet, there are applications that have data that Zillow doesn’t.
The examples of data listed above are just the tip of the iceberg. There are hundreds, nay thousands, of stats that interest home buyers. For example, if someone has children, then they may be interested in detailed information about local schools (say graduation rate or the percentage of kids admitted to a 4-year university) that other apps don’t have. Targeting specific groups is a way for your real estate mobile app to stand out.
There are tremendous advantages to be reaped when you build a robust brand. Randall Reilly opines, “A devoted following could prove to win out over everything else, including price.” There’s potential to add lots of value to the real estate mobile application business. Value means sales, and real estate sales are big hits.
If you get a 4% commission on a $400,000 house, then you’ve just earned $16,000 dollars. There’s a bountiful amount of apps being used in real estate sales. In other words, there are many opportunities to benchmark apps and improve them. Another way to provide value is to build a hyperlocal app that serves the customers in your immediate geographic area.
As mentioned earlier, mobile apps are exploding. In 2017, there were 197 billion app downloads, and that number is expected to triple in the next three years. The demand is tremendous, and it is only growing. Another key dynamic of mobile apps is the declining cost of mobile apps.
There is software out there that allows you to build an app for free. Naturally, the tradeoff is the time you’ll need to spend learning the software. Of course, you can always outsource your app building to a place like Upwork. Some countries have lower costs of living, so if you outsource to teams in those places, you can build an app for far less than $50,000, the oft-quoted starting cost of a complex app. The rising demand for apps and the lessening cost to build them is another reason mobile apps have a bright future.
What’s your favorite real estate mobile app? Leave your answer in the comments.
