If you’re looking at properties by way of Google Maps, you’ll now find a broker place page that has all sorts of information on that listing, and while some conjecture that this could rival National Association of Realtors’ (NAR) upcoming Realtors Property Resource site, we don’t see that unless it’s much improved somewhere down the road.

It’s nice but its probably more an enhancement to what’s out there already, not a rival. We see real estate agents and brokers adding this to their branding and listing repertoire, but not replacing another online listing resources with this new Google Maps product.

Google now offers details on the property (though still not as detailed as some real estate verticals or realtor sites), photos, placement on the local map, and a Street View. You can also determine what public transportation options are nearby. While it might not rival all real estate verticals it does offers links to those that offer the listing, and consumers can send the listings to their own or friends’ e-mails. No longer must users get this Google info by pop-up, a nice user-friendly feature.

 We looked at one property for sale in Phoenix AZ, for example. We clicked on the Google Maps icon, where we saw that the property was a foreclosure with an asking price of $39,900. A 2 bedroom, 1 bath home, Realty Store was the seller agent. (The broker’s name was hyperlinked). The property is 840 square feet, we learned. From the broker’s place page we learned that about the neighborhood, where the average house value is $151, 200.

There are nearly 11,000 homes in this area, whose average income is $57,519.  The neighborhood is home to 30,436 people, with a median age of 33.  Of these, 87.28 percent are white, 2.28 percent are black. Interesting that statistics break down by Indian, Asian and Hawaiian, all with fewer than 2 percent, but the other nearly 8 percent are listed as Other, in a neighborhood, city and state with a hefty Hispanic population. That would seem a “local” look by someone without any “local” understanding.  Nearly 41 percent of the neighbors are college graduates, its crime index is 244, and the turnover in residents is moderate.

There’s another major flaw to this, though a flaw not unique to Google. This listing was posted Nov. 30, days after the property was actually sold. The listing remains live today.

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