Internet portal Yahoo-Kimo Inc (
"The Internet has become the primary channel for home shopping," Rose Tsou (
The demand for online house searches has increased significantly along with the red hot property market in recent years, making the channel even more important, Tsou said.
Yahoo-Kimo inaugurated a property portal that provided listings from seven realtors in 2005.
The number of partners on the new site has expanded to 11, with six real estate agents including Sinyi Real Estate Inc (
POLL
A poll conducted by Yahoo-Kimo showed that 65 percent of Internet users said they search for properties online when they started shopping for new homes.
A survey of the 11 firms showed that in the past, realtors needed to take their customers to visit 13.6 apartments on average before a transaction was concluded.
Visits for those who searched houses online decreased to 6.3 apartments, which greatly increases the efficiency for agents, Yahoo-Kimo said.
Taking house listings online also helps to accelerate the time it takes to clinch deals. It takes about 28 days for home buyers who search for houses online to purchase a property, while it takes 39 days for those who don't, the survey showed.
"Online real estate is without doubt a trend in the market," said Howard Chou (
"Customers no longer need to waste time by physically visiting vast numbers of houses like they used to," he said.
Despite most real estate agents having their own sites to provide pictures and video clips of houses and apartments, the huge amount of traffic generated by Yahoo-Kimo has proven to bring even more business to the company, Chou said.
VIDEO CLIPS
Currently, Sinyi Real Estate has video clips for more than half of the properties it sells, which allows users to get an all round view of the houses, Chou said.
Other new functions provided by Yahoo-Kimo's new site include buying aids such as feng shui, legal and moving advice, decorating guides with different styles and budgets and online loan accounting.
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