The tool allowing homeowners to display pins on the map next to the homes for sale, in order to “sell their neighborhood” is a freakin’ success! More than 1500 pins were added on the map in various areas of Canada!

This success however created a problem in some areas where it was too popular. That’s why we’ve implemented a new fonction in the map search. A on/off “NEIGHBORHOOD” button is now available on top of the map, allowing the visitors to hide or show the neighborhood pins.

Here’s an example :

The Open Houses feature will be redesigned in the following weeks.

Organizing an open house day is a great way to attract visitors and potential buyers. If you got any suggestions concerning this tool, now is the moment!

We got a new cool tool online this week that will allow our clients to market their home by email to all of their contacts. This new feature is available to Gmail and MSN hotmail users only for now.

This tool allows you to retrieve your email contacts from your email account. A list of all your contacts will then be displayed before the message is sent. You’ll then be able to select the email addresses to whom you’d like to send your message.

Note that we do not keep copy of your mailbox login information.

If you use this option to market your home, don’t forget to ask your friends to pass the email along to their own contacts. This is a great way to increase the visits to listing!

The page is also available to all visitors going to the website if they wish to share their interest in a home they are dreaming of.

When you’re looking for a new home, you are searching for a house. But you’re also searching for a place where you’ll feel great and which will correspond to your lifestyle. So we’ve decided to develop a new tool that will allow our customers to “sell their neighborhood” to potential buyers!

In their online account, our clients have access to a new web page where they’ll be able to describe places of interest around their home. Schools, restaurants, parks, hospitals… It can be anything, as long as you feel like it is part of the reason why you love your area. You can see below for instructions on how to use this new tool.

The items saved by the private home sellers will be displayed to the website’s visitors in the map search interface. Arrow markers will show up next to the other markers. Clicking on those markers will open an info window with all the information entered by the home owner.

How to add my places of interest on the map ?

Here’s a little tutorial guiding you through the basic steps of adding neighborhood markers on the map :

1. Take a walk down the street and take some pictures of the cool places around; (640×480 would be perfect);
2. In your ByTheOwner account, click on the Your Neighborhood button;
3. Optional : Fill in the address fields, the map will then position a marker automatically;
4. Click on the map to make sure the marker is on the right spot;
5. Type in a brief description that will communicate your passion for your neighborhood to potential buyers;
6. Click the “Add” button. Voilà!

Note that you’ll be able to complete and modify the description later. Now, let’s see how to add your pictures :

1. Click on the “Browse” button;
2. Go get the picture on your computer and click “Open”;
3. Press the “Go” button;
4. You can select your pictures order by dragging them (if you have more than one, eh!);

So… where is Canada’s coolest city?

You have an incredible idea that would bring your visits on ByTheOwner to a greater level of satisfaction? You think many other visitors share your need?

Welcome to the suggestion box!

This new section, dedicated to our visitors, is online since yesterday. We’ve been using it for a couple of weeks with suggestions from our staff and got pretty interesting results, so we decided to open it up to the visitors! Here is how it works :

Read the rest of this entry »

Remodeling an existing home, rather than building a new one, is the ‘greenest’ decision a homeowner can make. Open land is preserved and the energy required to make the materials for a new house (concrete, lumber, metals, plastics) is saved.

Another excellent post about green living, read at real-estate-bloggers.com »

According to Yahoo!, NY city is amongst the cities that are doing a great job at putting residents first. New York is among them. In fact, New Yorkers burn gasoline at the rate the U.S. did in the 1920s!!

Yahoo! has also donated a fleet of hybrid taxis to New York City, which recently determined it produces 1% of all U.S. greenhouse gases. By displacing traditionally fueled cabs with hybrid taxis, Yahoo! is helping New York City edge closer to its ambitious environmental goals. The City will also save enough gas to drive a hybrid vehicle 56 times around the Earth.[…]

Read more on Real-Estate-Bloggers.com »

For those of you webmasters who are using Google Analytics to monitor your website’s stats and who are wondering why nobody came to visit them today, note that the stats service is currently on hold. Neither your stats or your visitors are lost!
There is a temporary reporting delay within Google Analytics accounts. For most accounts, reporting is current through this past Saturday night. Please note that no data will be lost - data will continue to be collected and processed during this time.

Google Analytics Blog »

Here is a Google Adword I’ve just found on the blog…

I really don’t know if it’s a bug or a very brilliant ad, for I’m sure it’s clicked a lot!