Web Tool to Help Navigate NYC Real Estate
With nearly a million buildings in New York's five boroughs alone, and many of those buildings with multiple properties for sale or rent, real-estate professionals face a daunting task. The city is one of the most competitive markets in the world, and people in the business need as much help as possible keeping track of listings, properties and the sale or rental status of those properties -- to name just a few tasks they must juggle.
Thu, July 16, 2009
IDG News Service — With nearly a million buildings in New York's five boroughs alone, and many of those buildings with multiple properties for sale or rent, real-estate professionals face a daunting task. The city is one of the most competitive markets in the world, and people in the business need as much help as possible keeping track of listings, properties and the sale or rental status of those properties -- to name just a few tasks they must juggle.
A New York startup is trying to make their jobs easier with a new Web-based tool based on Microsoft's Virtual Earth 3D mapping technology. REonomy, in Manhattan's Lower East Side neighborhood, so far has gathered information about more than 3.2 million properties in New York and New Jersey. The company delivers that information in a Web-based application that can, among other things, generate instant reports about properties that people can access not only on a PC but also on mobile devices.
Co-founders Charlie Oshman and Jonathan Arnold, both in their 20s, started the business a little more than a year ago. Arnold worked in several aspects of real estate -- commercial real estate, research and investment sales among them -- and realized there were "unfulfilled needs" in terms of tools to help people in that industry work more efficiently, Oshman said.
Oshman, with a background in marketing and technology, is the technology geek behind the operation, leading the company on product development. "As far as Jon was concerned, everything was left wide open for a new player, and I helped figure out how to put it together," he said.
The two came up with the idea in February 2008 and started in earnest to look for funding a few months later, finding it in the form of some angel investors from the industry. The REonomy tool, sold on a subscription basis for between US$500 to $560 a user to real-estate professionals, went live about 2 1/2 months ago.
People with various job roles -- among them are real-estate agents, financial analysts, architects, mortgage appraisers and insurance companies -- need real-estate information in New York, Oshman said. Because REonomy had to serve the needs of so many different professionals, they conducted focus groups to find out what kind of information would be most helpful to them, he said.
REonomy aggregates information about properties, such as who owns the building, expense and income reports, and zoning, square footage and mortgage information, from both private and public sources, Oshman said.
