Find your dream home with these real estate search sites

The real estate market is in trouble and housing prices are plummeting. In other words, it is a great time to buy a house.

That's why we've compiled a list of real estate search sites and examined how well they can help you find your next home.

DotHomes
If you're looking to find homes, but you don't know where to start, DotHomes might be it. It's not the best real estate search site in this roundup, but it does a fine job of taking listings from across the Web and getting them to you quickly.

DotHomes sports a simple design, but I had issues with it. Its catalog view of all the listings is great and it provides basic information about the properties, but putting Google Maps with all the listings' locations above the individual homes makes little sense and I found myself scrolling up and down to figure out where they were. Worse, the site's filtering tools are placed next to the map, which meant I was forced to once again scroll to the top of the page just to narrow my search results.

If you want the most listings, DotHomes is the ideal destination. After inputting "New York City" into the site's search box, it returned 48,000 listings. That tally easily bested any other service in this roundup by thousands of properties. Thinking it must be a mistake, I tried my search again with quotations around "New York, NY" to ensure that's what it was searching for and it returned the same number of results. When I narrowed my search to individual ZIP codes and suburbs around the country, DotHomes continued to provide me with the most results. It was outstanding.

It should be noted that DotHomes doesn't have its own listings pages. Instead, it delivers search results from realty sites around the Web. Once you click on a property listing, you'll be brought to different realty Web sites. I found that annoying.

Realtor.com

Realtor.com is a huge site featuring millions of listings from across the Web. And although it takes all those listings from real estate agents, it doesn't redirect you to a realtor's page like DotHomes does, which makes it more usable.

Realtor.com's page is cluttered. It features a prominent search box, which is nice, but that's flanked by advertisements, featured listings in areas across the U.S., and some tools to help you in your real estate search that are only somewhat useful. That said, its search results pages are better designed and feature all the necessities--filter and display preferences--above and to the side of the listings. The listings pages are outstanding and feature the property's description and most importantly, a Live Maps display showing exactly where the property is located.

Although Realtor.com is a major site, I was a little disappointed with its search results. After inputting "New York City" into the search field, it only returned a little over 18,000 results. When I input a specific New York ZIP code--10012--it only returned 8 results. That's much fewer than the results derived from DotHomes. It was even beat badly by DotHomes in every suburban search I performed.

Realtor.com's listings pages were outstanding and featured all the information you'd expect from a real estate Web site, like mortgage calculators, interest rate finders, school locators, and tax information. The wealth of knowledge makes Realtor.com a fine destination if you don't mind fewer listings, but want more information.

Terabitz
Terabitz is a neat site that tries to make searching for real estate listings different than competing services. And although it achieves that goal, it will take some getting used to if you're accustomed to sites like Trulia or Realtor.com.

I was really impressed with the design of Terabitz. After inputting an area, the site returns all the listings it can find from across the Web, but also includes a series of tabs above those listings that provide links to services that can help you find information about the area where you're considering moving. Its "Local" tab features links to all the airports, hospitals, restaurants, and other places in a given area and displays them all on a Google Maps display to the left of the listings.

When I started searching for listings in Terabitz, I was disappointed with the number of results it returned. In fact, just under 3,000 listings were displayed when I searched for New York City properties. When I drilled down into one ZIP code, it found just three listings. Unfortunately, Terabitz isn't too capable when you want to search for suburban listings, either. Unlike Realtor.com or DotHomes, Terabitz had trouble finding listings in some areas I searched for and returned no results when others returned hundreds of listings.

My biggest complaint with the Terabitz search isn't the number of listings, though. Instead, I was disappointed with how long it took for the results page to load. It took longer than any other service in this roundup to deliver results and I found myself performing two searches on Trulia in the time it took to load a single Terabitz result page.

Trulia

Trulia features an outstanding design, a fair amount of listings, and some extra features like buying advice, that make it a great service to use when you decide to buy your next property.

Trulia may not feature the best design in this roundup--Terabitz gets that award--but it's designed almost as well. The home page features a prominent search box, a "news feed" for those who want to see new listings in areas they've searched for in the past, and links to foreclosure listings in areas where they have hit hardest. Its search results pages boast the same filter tools you'll find in sites like Realtor.com and its Google Maps display at the top right of the page makes locating properties easy. Even better, Trulia listings pages show Google Street View displays instead of maps, so you can see exactly what the building you want to buy looks like before you go there. It's a simple addition, but also the best feature on the site.

I was a little underwhelmed by the number of listings Trulia returned. When I searched for New York City properties, it found over 10,000 listings and when I narrowed it down to just one ZIP code, it found almost 200 listings. It doesn't come anywhere close to the number of listings you would find on DotHomes.

Much like Realtor.com, Trulia found a slew of suburban properties in disparate parts of the country and unlike Terabitz, returned those results quickly. Suffice it to say that searching on Trulia was a treat.

But Trulia's offerings go beyond listings. The site's "Stats and Trends" page is an outstanding resource to find out about the community you're thinking of moving to and its "Advice and Opinions" page will come in handy when you're ready to buy your home.

Trulia is a great service to find listings and learn about communities, but it's also the easiest to use out of any real estate search service. It's the best real estate search tool in this roundup. Period.

Where's Zillow?
Some of you are probably wondering why I decided not to include Zillow in this roundup. The answer is quite simple: I consider it a research tool, rather than a standard real estate search site.

I know that you can search for homes for sale on the site and it boasts thousands of listings, but anyone who has used the site knows that it's difficult to find homes thanks to a cluttered Live Maps display. That said, Zillow is extremely useful when searching for the value of a home.

In my own research for a home, I use a site like Trulia to find a property and perform better research on it with the help of Zillow. So, yeah, maybe it's a real estate search site in one sense, but I think it's a much better research tool. In fact, it's the best real estate research tool on the market.

[Freiheit13]

redfin.com is another great one. Lets you search by area (zip code for instance) and shows all the matches in that area on a map. Click on a listing to view details or scroll the list below the map to see summary info. You can also narrow down your search to houses/condos/townhouses, number of beds/baths, etc.

[KHannemann]

You may well find that a lot of the "outstanding" number of listings on DotHomes are duplicated, under contract, sold, expired or withdrawn - which for the average home searcher will be a huge PITA. There is no other reason for DotHomes to have more listings than any of the others, especially Realtor.com.

[dafron]

Good review! You might want to also check out another player in this field of home listings called www.FindBuyers.com, (although it looks like it is just being rolled out in the Washington DC - mid-Atlantic area for now). What is interesting about the website is that it lets buyers be much more specific about their preferences, down to terms, etc. and then the site finds potential matches that are rated according to their correlation to what the buyer wants. The seller can also filter on the pool of buyers - you can remain anonymous until you want to initiate contact. They don't charge buyers, sellers or agents for the service.

[OwlDad]

Don,
One thing I'd like to point out is that it appears you used Manhattan (and NYC for the most part) as your test case. In all fairness the NY market is not your typical market. I agree that chances are that DOTHomes had more listings than Realtor.com may be due to 2 things: 1. Many of their listings are no longer active (maybe, i don't know that for a fact) and 2. New York has not embraced using a multiple listing services the way the rest of the nation has, meaning that many properties are still sold privately (exlusive listings or whatever else you want to call it). Realtor.com is an arm of the National Association of Realtors and has pretty much all of the listings that exist in all the different MLS systems. So having more listings than them is suspect. BUT again New York is such a uniqure market that it's probably a bad overall test case. And believe me I'm not a fan of Realtor.com so please don't take this as an endorsement on my part of them in any way shape of form.

[crowtl]

Another good site for searching by owner property is www.InfoTube.net. In addition to property searches, any builder, owner or agent can post home listings for Free, buyers can see property not posted anywhere else. The listings are always fresh and the site has no dead foreclosure of come on advertising.

Infotube.net is owned by the company that makes the Infotube and Infobox brochure holders that attach to for sale signs. Their marketing products are sold at Lowes and Home Depot and are Made In the USA. Good company to support.

[Andy212NYC]

Trulia by far dominates the NYC experience. As a broker in the area, no site touches their coverage and they have no duplicates. In NYC, 11K listings is it - b/c that is Manhattan. If you looked at Brooklyn, Queens, Staten island, etc. Trulia blows them away. For some reason Trulia treats NYC as just manhattan, not the 5 boroughs. If there are 80K listings for sale in NYC, that is nuts, just not real. Maybe in the NY Metro...but not NYC.

[renicolay]

The way you ended the post you made it sound as through researching is different that home shopping. Although this may be true, I believe that most home shoppers are also performing research on their new neighborhoods, comparable homes etc...hopefully given the market.

I recommend trying Cyberhomes.com. With over 3 million active listings, we offer a robust home search and back it up with unprecedented access to neighborhood and surrounding home data. Then as the homeowner moves into their new house they can continue using Cyberhomes to watch their home value, and neighborhood facts.

Reggie from Cyberhomes

[yanniraz]

In today's turbulent real estate market, it has never been more important to select the realtor that will best represent the interests of the client. In a marketplace filled with opportunity, valuable tax incentives and fluctuating values, proven experience, integrity, market awareness and outstanding communication skills are essential. No client can afford to compromise on these qualities. Real estate acquisitions and sales are too significant to place in the care of inexperienced, unproven realtors.

Whether dealing with a commercial or residential property transaction, the client should verify that the realtor is a member in good standing with the National Association of Realtors (NAR). This membership assures the client of the realtor's commitment to educational programs and compliance with standards of ethical conduct and cooperation. The National Association of Realtors has been instrumental in developing and implementing high ethical standards of conduct throughout the industry.

In addition to enrollment with the NAR, the realtor that can best locate and list for sale either residential or commercial properties will be a member of a Multiple Listing Service (MLS). The MLS is a regional marketplace that is designed to assure clients of maximum exposure to available properties and the cooperation of many other real estate companies. Whether buying or selling, clients should insist that the realtor be a member of the local Multiple Listing Service.

It is important to recognize that the term realtor refers to the agency itself. Realtors, or real estate brokers, retain agents that list, sell and lease real estate, on behalf of the realtor. However, the realtor is responsible for the activity and conduct of its agents, the company's marketing plans and the interaction with other cooperating brokerages. Selecting a proven and reputable realtor can maximize the sale of a real estate property and assure the buyer of making an informed choice.

Real estate marketing has changed dramatically in the past few years. The industry has been impacted by the advent of enhanced MLS services that have made properties available for review on the internet. A recent survey showed that nearly 70% of residential homebuyers began their search on the internet. In today's marketplace, the best realtors have fine-tuned internet strategies, marketing plans and communication programs that keep their agents, their listings and their clients abreast of activity as it occurs.

Programs such as virtual tours and digital photography can do much to enhance the visibility of listings and can be supplemented with the availability of aerial photographs, tax documents and copies of deeds and disclosure statements. Good realtors are capitalizing on the public's desire for internet access by creating web logs for listings, agents and relevant projects.

As important as the internet is to overall real estate marketing, it is imperative to select a realtor with outstanding communication capabilities. There is no reason for a realtor to miss a call or be unaware of market activity as it happens. The best realtors understand the importance of being on top of the market at all times and are always available to their clients. With advances in new telephone systems, buyers and sellers alike will benefit from a relationship with a realtor who is always at the ready.

Traditional real estate marketing activities, like signs, brochures, flyers, business cards and even Open Houses still have value in the marketplace. Good realtors incorporate these standards with new-age technology to maximize exposure and facilitate the purchase and sale process.

All sound realtors are current on mortgage markets. Many of the best realtors have direct lines of access to lending institutions and programs. In today's marketplace, clients should examine the realtor's knowledge and connections to the financing arm of the industry. A realtor's ability to connect buyers and sellers to suitable financing can have a big impact o a property's marketability and can help bring transactions together easily.
http://homesinsale.com

[cfb4]

Another new real estate search engine is http://www.SpaceSearch.com which has maps, and some very powerful filtering options.