The San Francisco Real Estate Blog

John Cook's Venture Blog - Zooming in on real estate listings

Online aerial maps are changing the way people look for new homes. Kirkland-based HouseValues Inc. entered the game today with a free service called HomePages.

As my story points out today, HouseValues is one of a number of entrants in this emerging category. Others include Seattle-based Redfin -- backed by Madrona Venture Group -- and San Francisco-based Trulia -- a Stanford University project with undisclosed investors.

And then there is Seattle-based Zillow -- the mysterious online real estate project founded by former Expedia Chief Executive Rich Barton.

There are some very interesting links here. One of the real problems that we as real estate agents have these days is trying to keep up with the new sales technologies that threaten to overwhelm us. The only thing that changes faster than our inventory is the ways we have to manage and sell it.