A Look Into the Past… Old Screenshots of Real Estate Websites

Man we have come a long way in just a few short years…

If you are familiar with the Wayback Machine, then you know how addictive it can be. I thought it would be fun to take a look at some old real estate websites…

Zillow.com — February 9th, 2006 (Zillow officially opens it’s doors to the public. Back then, they claimed 60 million homes, now they claim 67 million. In one year’s time this company has turned the real estate industry upside down in controversy, and has spearheaded much of real estate’s web 2.0 growth.)

RealEstate.com — January 2nd, 1997 (Before it changed owners a few times)

Activerain.com — April 28th 2006 (Before ActiveRain became a huge blogging community for real estate professionals, it was a lead generating service.)

Inman.com — November 7th, 1996 (Inman News, the company started by Brad Inman, is by far the oldest and most authoritative real estate news service in existence. I’m suprised at how active his site was way back in ‘96. I wonder if his aol email address still works… One article, I read on the site is really fascinating. It is a discussion about the possibility of conducting paperless real estate transactions online. Really interesting stuff. These guys were cutting edge even 10 years ago!)

Loopnet.com — November 9th, 1996 (Another interesting find. They seem to have a very similar model even after 10 years. Back in the day when so many online services were charging for simple services, Loopnet was offering free access to commercial listings.)

Remax.com — November 21st, 1996 (it took a while forRe/Max to catch on, but they are finally offering a decent property search tool on their site. When you click on search properties on the old site, it takes you to their “Search for Home Properties” page that explains why they don’t have one single tool to search for homes. So, they list 3 of their other websites to visit if you are searching, but is clear to point out that not all of their listings can be found. We certainly have come far in property search…)

Homes.com — February 13th, 1997 (Today, Homes.com is one of the most trafficked real estate websites in the world. This is another one that has changed hands a few times. It looks like the site was owned by Homes & Land Magazine back in the day. They claimed at the time that they were the largest real estate company online with over 250,000 homes.)

Realtor.com — December 20th, 2000 (I had trouble loading the old archived page of realtor.com. This was the closest I could get. The archive dates all the way back to Oct. ‘97. At the time, they claimed that they could search 1.4 million homes. Today, it is over 3 million. They still get more traffic than any other real estate website. But Zillow is starting to give them a run for their money in the way of traffic…)

Related posts:

• THE Ultimate Guide to TOP ranking in Local Real Estate Searches
• Real Estate Videos… The Good, The Bad, The…
• The Art of Puking Your Business Identity Onto the Internet
• 8 Unique Ways to Use Google Alerts To Capture New Customers
• More Functionality from Del.icio.us