Hemnet launches iPAD app & focus on entertainment

Yesterday at the SIME conference (hyped Internet event in Stockholm with focus on media) Hemnet announced that they are developing an iPAD application to be released in spring. Hemnet is the largest residential listing service in Sweden.

Screenshot is from DagensMedia. 

Functionality

The development firm Apegroup will build the app (they've also built the iPhone and Android app for Hemnet over the last year).

"Focus will be on maps, large attractive photos, inspiration and to have all information accessible in the easiest way possible" says Anders Graffman, CEO Apegroup   (my translation)

An additional feature is that it will be possible to save photos on the iPad for inspiration for future decoration projects. 

Carl-Henric Borg, CEO of Hemnet, also points out that the iPad app will:  (my translation)

"... the iPAD app could also be used as a tool for the brokers/agents to present alternative listings during an open house" 

More about Hemnet

Following the SIME event over Twitter also gave some additional insights to the Hemnet business case:

• 1,4 million unique visitors per week    (15% of all inhabitants in Sweden!) 
• The growth of visitors per week has been +27% over the last year 
• 220 000 downloads of the iPhone App  
• 3rd largest referrer is Facebook
• 30% of the visitors use Hemnet for 'entertainment'  
• 150 000 listings per year 
• to list is free for the brokers
• fee to banks for referrals for loan 

And the final news item; a new version of Hemnet's website is to be launched "later this autumn"(?). Isn't that snow in the streets of Stockholm?   ;-)   

My thoughts

Having tried US based real estate iPAD apps like Zillow (residential) and Loopnet (commercial) I believe this move by Hemnet is a clever one. 

My suggestion would be to create a specialised version of the iPAD app for the brokers/agents in order to give them a great presentation tool in their meetings/open house with the clients. Take a look at this video for Zillows iPAD app (CEO Rich Bartons blog post about it) and read this success story and you will see the benefits.

At my day job as Product Manager at Datscha, I've used iPADs extensively over the last couple of months running short sales presentations at different events/conferences and it is working brilliantly. It's easy and almost invisible to bring with you, starts in a second and you can quickly flip through a presentation (mostly used PDF over Dropbox). 

I could just imagine how great it would be for a real estate agent with a dedicated iPAD app like above. 

Great use of Silverlight PivotViewer for residential listings

What a coincidence, the same week as a debate started on the blog Future of Real Estate Marketing (an Inman company) why (or if) 'the map based search was dead' an absolute stunning new search tool was launched on the Swedish market called BostadsPivot ('RealEstatePivot').

The service 

A software developer named Magnus Ohlsson has used the Silverlight control PivotViewer combined with listings data from the Booli API (a Swedish residential listing service) to create this tool. 

Hard to explain the tool in one picture but each photo represents one listing the different columns are in this case the representing different price intervals. 

Try it

It's for sure worth trying. And for all non Swedish speaking here is the short manual.  

 In the panel to the left one decides how to limit the search. In the drop down menu in the upper right corner one choose how to 'group' the listings. And finally there are two icons (upper right corner) for how to view the result.

Read more about the tool at the developers blog (in English). Where you also find more information about the PivotViewer, including a great TED presentation on the topic.

My thoughts

First of all, the PivotViewer technology is impressive and this example for sure takes advantage of it. It gives a new way to browse the listings. The downside is to make it as user friendly as needed for the average user. Furthermore, the integration of a map could be better. However, the use of technology is brilliant. Other listing services will hopefully be inspired by this.

Datscha launches in Finland

(Full disclosure: This post is a shameless self-promotion when I'm the Product Manager at Datscha. I try to stay clear from writing about Datscha on this blog, but this is to good to be left out.)

Datscha, the Swedish SaaS solution for the commercial property market, launched last week it's services in Finland by adding data on 140 000 properties and market information for 7 municipalities (to be 50 soon).

Property data

The data to be found on all commercial properties in Finland includes  id, owner, type code, land area and total size of the building. 

Below is the rather useless, but all so cool view of all the 510 000 (!) commercial properties in Sweden and Finland. 

Makes much more sense when zooming in.

On a detailed level the user is able to do a 'mouse over' on any property icon and see the id, owner and type code. There is also a link for more details.  

Market data

As in Sweden, market data from a consulting firm is available in order for the user to getting a better understanding of what office sub markets that exist and their rent-, vacancy- and yield-levels.

More information

Is found at www.datscha.com and through the press release (in English). 

My thoughts

Very proud indeed.  ;-)