Real estate and rental agents get into big trouble if they mouth off about a neighborhood’s quality of life issues. The most they can do is point to web sites that provide some general stats (i.e. school info, crime stats and market trends).
Now Trulia is getting deeper, a la user generated content. Three weeks ago, it launched ratings on 12, well-researched quality of life issues. Ratings are provided on a one to five star basis, and include safety; pet-friendliness; walkability; restaurants & shopping; parks & recreation; schools; traffic; parking; entertainment & nightlife; public transportation; community involvement; and cleanliness. Users may submit their ratings via mobile or Internet. So far, more than 140,000 ratings have come in.
Today, Trulia added reviews as well. The site is asking users to “tell us about the surrounding area, be it the neighborhood, sub-neighborhood, or actual block. The more local your knowledge, the more helpful it will be to another person! Do you live on the coolest block in your city? Tell us about it. Does your neighborhood have the best restaurants and stores? We want to know.” Over time, the site hopes to showcase its aggregated local area ratings, and reviews for every neighborhood and every block.
Think about your own neighborhood. Would you have been able to use something like this? I would have. After seven years, I have learned that my neighborhood is very safe, relatively pet-friendly (except for the lurking Coyotes), and has excellent shopping and restaurants that are nearby, but requires a car to get to. Other than dining, it has no nightlife. It has good schools through middle school, but the high school is in the tougher, adjacent town. It has very good parking, lots of tot lots, two pools and weekly block parties for young children but no other community involvement. It is also quite clean.
It might not be the neighborhood for everyone. Most of this would have been picked up by Trulia’s ratings system, which has been expertly thought out by its research team.
Thanks Peter.
Looking forward to reading your review of your neighborhood!
We’re waiting until we hit a critical mass of ratings and reviews and then we’ll start integrating them fully into the site.
Best
Pete
YEA!!!!!
Now Agents can provide unbiased reviews of their Market Areas for VIP Badge points!!LOL
Yea for the lucky Consumer Yea!!!!ROTFLOL
Lucky Consumer…Agent reviews
of their Market areas done for VIP Badge points…..
Good stuff LOL
I see your point about potential hyping of neighborhoods by agents. But anyone can submit ratings and reviews. I think there will be a lot of “civilian” reviews, here.
I have answered 2,254 questions at Trulia and gotten credit for 1,801 helpful answers (4th all time at Trulia and 10th for Best answers)in just over a year.
http://www.trulia.com/voices/directory/-all?sort_order=most_liked
I believe completely that claim of “civilian reviews” is just that..a claim..
The fact is Trulia is pushing this on THEIR site to the Agents not “civilians” and I completely believe it’s bogus…I say here, at Trulia and anywhere else…BOGUS & Consumers should be very skeptical of their value….PERIOD..It’s just content filler and a way to reward Agents with points so they can have a Badge on their Profile suggesting they contribute quality…
Consumers this grumpy old contributor from TRULIA says BOGUS…period.
Thank-you for allowing me to share my honest opinion.
See what Agents are saying here about this and on numerous other Questions/Blogs.
Trulia Blog…http://www.trulia.com/voices/-Using_Trulia-36-
Neighborhood data is great stuff if you can get it. You also should check out http://nabewise.com/ which looks like it is venturing into similar territory.