Google to Drop Real Estate Listings
Google announced that it will drop real estate listings that real estate professionals upload to its classified site Google Base, as well as any for-sale, foreclosure, or rental properties through its search function on Google Maps.
The real estate listings at the site will discontinue by Feb. 10, 2011.
Google officials say they decided to stop featuring the real estate listings because of low usage and the popularity of other property-search tools on real estate Web sites. Google Base also is being replaced by Google Shopping APIs, which will not support real estate listings.
Google says visitors still will be able to be use Google to find real estate information and Web sites and explore neighborhoods through Google Street View.
"This does not come as a surprise to me,” Pete Flint, CEO of property search site Trulia, told Inman News. “Even with Google's huge audience, it shows having listing data is clearly not enough to deliver a good real estate search experience and build audience."
Source: “Google Drops Real Estate Listings,” Inman News (Jan. 26, 2011)
