Yahoo! and Zoocasa Join Forces Today
Posted by SmartCalgaryHomes.com Blogging Team on Monday, August 30th, 2010 at 12:57pm.
Today, Yahoo! and Zoocasa rolled out an application that puts Zoocasa’s online real estate search at the fingertips of Yahoo! members. Zoocasa, owned nearly entirely by Rogers Communications Inc., is said to be “Canada’s fastest growing real estate search”. With 17 million Yahoo! users, Zoocasa stands to grow even faster now that this application brings Canadian real estate even closer to Canadian Internet users.
Zoocasa.com uses advanced mapping technology and many search options, including:
- Region
- City
- Price Range
- Property type
- Number of bedrooms
- Number of bathrooms
This application joins many others that Yahoo! offers to its users, including Flickr, Monster (one of Canada’s major job-search sites), Facebook and eBay. The increasing variety of applications is one of Yahoo!’s major appeals to Canadian consumers and with the addition of Zoocasa, real estate professionals have a new venue to market their homes.
Zoocasa offers agents the ability to upload listings, answer questions on the Ask the Pros section (location specific), upload location-specific images onto the mapping feature and features an iPhone application. For consumers, the mapping feature, location information and extensive home information options are aimed at making real estate more accessible and information about specific areas easier to find.
Zoocasa landed in a complicated situation in September 2009, when Century 21 filed a lawsuit alleging that it was “scraping” Century 21 real estate listings and reposting them to the Zoocasa.com site. Zoocasa has claimed that it is a “complimentary service”, not a rival. This has not convinced Century , already feeling pressure from a November 2009 ruling by Canada’s Competition Bureau that has determined that the MLS needs to change its format to become more open for consumers.
Yahoo! Canada stands to gain much from this exchange, especially if Zoocasa wins out and the rules regarding Canadian real estate listings are further relaxed. By offering users the option for a more flexible and informative real estate search, Yahoo! could well corner the market on non-MLS home searches and gain even more influence with Canadian consumers.
More Information
Century Canada does battle with Rogers
Yahoo! Canada Launches Zoocasa Real Estate Application for House-Hunting Canadians
Big-name realtors plot rival listings site
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