Freakish Depth

This is probably a good time to sing the praises of Property Shark.  I should start by saying that Redfin has one of the best web sites, period - not just the best real estate web site, but best overall.  It combines an almost comically broad range of useful information about homes, and somehow manages to present it in an engaging and highly readable manner.  It's responsive, fun, informative, and incredibly addictive.

As I previously mentioned, I had attended a Redfin homebuying seminar late last year.  It was very informative and helpful, and one of the things that pushed me toward working with Redfin.  The presenter included an extremely useful list of helpful web sites, and made particular note of Property Shark, which she cheerfully explained had a lot of data that even Redfin doesn't have.

And, boy, does it ever.  Property Shark isn't nearly as pretty as Redfin, but the amount of information it has is amazing, maybe even a little scary.  You can search for properties in any supported area, and pull out an incredible amount of information from there.  Things like:

• The owner's name
• The owner's address (thus providing one of the only ways that you can determine the owner-occupancy ratio of a building or area)
• Complete sales price for the property.  You might see that a house sold for $40,000 in 1945, for $120,000 in 1990, for $800,000 in 2006.  If you see that it's on the market today for $700,000, you know that the seller is already accepting a major loss on the property.
• The loans on the property.  So a house might show, for example, a $417,000 first loan from Wells Fargo, and a second $105,000 loan from Citibank.  Again, this is amazing information.  You can check to see whether the seller is likely underwater - if they bought in 2006 or 2007, have loans close to the purchase price, and are asking for something close to the last sales price, then they are probably already as low as they can go without negotiating a short sale.  Conversely, if a home sold 15 years ago with a sensible loan and the owner is asking twice as much for it now, they may have considerably more flexibility.
• A ton of maps!  There's a population density graph, which seems to operate on a neighborhood-by-neighborhood basis, that shows the number of residents per square mile in an area.
• There's a population age map, which shows the median age of each neighborhood.  (This is an area where you can really visibly see Millbrae's strong dichotomy between young and old.)
• There's an environmental hazard map, which shows EPA-designated hazardous sites, which range from scary brownfields to innocuous photo development chemicals.
• There's an earthquake hazard map, which shows which areas are vulnerable to liquefaction, sliding, or other problems.  (Lots of this in the Bay Area, but Millbrae is surprisingly safe.)
• A flood zone map.  This was yet another incredibly useful find; usually, you can't find this out until near the end of closing or with a ton of legwork to track down paper FEMA maps from a government agency.  The map breaks down areas in a 100-Year Flood Zone, a 500-Year Flood Zone, or other area of concern.  Having access to this let me determine which areas I could feel safe about and which needed concern.  Nearly all of Burlingame east of El Camino Real is in a flood zone, and a lot of the western area is as well; Millbrae had a few tendrils of 500-year flood zones, but none ran through the blocks where I was interested.  Success!
• The public records for a property.  This seems especially invaluable for FSBOs or older transactions; you can find out the official square footage, number of bedrooms, and so on.  The Bay Area (and probably much of California) has a pretty significant problem with people performing unpermitted renovations, done without county approval, in an attempt to dodge a property tax increase; you can spot where a seller's statements don't line up with the official word, and be prepared to deal with the extra headaches involved with an illegal property addition.

The Redfin web site seeks for Freakish Depth, but I think Property Shark got there first.  That said, the combination makes an unstoppable one-two punch.  While PS has awesome data, their site is relatively hard to navigate, and you need to register with them to even get started.  (For what it's worth, I've been registered for half a year, and never got spammed, so I think they're safe.  They make their money by charging professional agents and investors for unlimited access.  Regular schmoes like you and me can still see all the data, but only for a limited number (maybe 10?) of properties per day.)  With the combination, you can use Redfin to quickly perform powerful searches that sift through everything on the market and help you narrow down what you're interested in; then, once you decide what specific properties you're serious about, you can use Property Shark to dive deeper and get a tactical advantage in your purchase.

As you can see, I'm a fan.  I think Property Shark is a harbinger in the same way Redfin is: the real estate model is moving from the traditional closed, secretive, divided world that kept consumers at arms-length from the transaction, and moving towards a more modern Web-ish approach of empowered consumers who drive their own searches and be responsible for their own education.  It will be fascinating to see how the real estate world I sell in will be different from the evolving world in which I bought.