Realtor.ca vs. Zoocasa

[FlamesAddiction]

Hey,

I was just wondering if there was a difference between these sites, other than just cosmetic, or there are even better search tools out there. Also, are these types of sites comprehensive, or is it still better to go to the various individual real estate company websites even if it takes longer?

Thanks.

[Travis Munroe]

If your in the market and have a fairly good criteria of what you want, the absolute best way to go about searching is to have your realtor set you up on a auto search system. This will give you access to listings before they even hit realtor.ca. Although its a matter of hours, these hours can be the difference between getting a property or not. Last week alone I did 2 deals where we were inside the listing before it was on realtor.ca and ended up writing offers/getting the places due to the speed.
If your more of a casual browser, find a site you like and go with it. realtor.ca or a realtor's website who syncs to the realtor.ca system will be the most accurate however I understand it is not always the most user friendly. I have heard that zoocasa misses listings every now and then (although I can't confirm this).

[Winsor_Pilates]

The new remax.ca is pretty user friendly IMO.
These sites use the same data that realtor.ca has, but may offer a more user friendly experience.

[bizaro86]

I wasn't familiar with zoocasa, but after looking through it I don't think it has much extra to offer over just using realtor.ca

Also, it's worth checking out the mls search on Travis's site, which has some features (square footage) not available on the public mls that are really worthwhile.

[ranchlandsselling]

Anyone notice the trend over the last 5 years to start bull****ing on the property size. Listings used to include above ground space. Then over the last couple of years Realtor's started listing condo's with balcony, basement or even garage space. A 1,200 sf townhouse was suddenly 2,100. Then obviously the houses had to play catch up, 3,100 sf and then the description would be 3,100 sf of living space.

Anyway, started to annoy me, wondered if anyone else noticed this when browsing through listings.

I'll try some other sites, not really fond of the new realtor.ca but wasn't fond of the last change either. I liked the old little clickable neighborhood map

[Travis Munroe]

Why any realtor would bs on size is beyond me. You can be sued over inaccurate size and a lack of due diligence.
I don't like spending up to $500 for each listing to be professionally measured but I do to protect my clients and I.
As for condos, it states right on the survey plans what is included in condo size. If the developer sold it as X sq ft including the balcony then the owner will as well.
Perhaps a building goes up where balcony sizes are all over the map. This would make sense to include balcony size within the registered size so that someone with a 500 sq ft unit but 250 sq ft balcony pays the same as someone with a 700 sq ft unit and 50 sq ft balcony.

[ranchlandsselling]

Originally Posted by Realtor 1

Why any realtor would bs on size is beyond me. You can be sued over inaccurate size and a lack of due diligence.
I don't like spending up to $500 for each listing to be professionally measured but I do to protect my clients and I.
As for condos, it states right on the survey plans what is included in condo size. If the developer sold it as X sq ft including the balcony then the owner will as well.
Perhaps a building goes up where balcony sizes are all over the map. This would make sense to include balcony size within the registered size so that someone with a 500 sq ft unit but 250 sq ft balcony pays the same as someone with a 700 sq ft unit and 50 sq ft balcony.

Well technically it's not B/S as long as it's accurate. But, what I'm saying is 5 years (or longer, I'm getting old), it was above ground, then in what was perhaps condo's trying to complete with SFH's, condo listings started to get bigger by including other space that while technically accurate was never considered above ground space (apples to apples), so home listings had to one up condo's, not all, but I see it often enough, they list the whole house, but include basement as basement space or in the description say "living space" which makes it not B/S...

Maybe I'm out to lunch, but that's what I was seeing.

First three condos I checked. The first one, adding up the measurements equals about 84 m3, which is about 900 sq. ft. Where's the extra 900 sq. ft. coming from? I'm sure there's stairs, and bathrooms, but even if you could balconies maybe a few hundred... so 1,100 - 1,200 like the latter, so where's the next 600 sq. ft.?

Most SFH listings don't include basements, why do condos? They didn't use to.

http://beta.realtor.ca/propertyDetai...rtyId=13863980

http://beta.realtor.ca/propertyDetai...rtyId=13585746

http://beta.realtor.ca/propertyDetai...rtyId=13645027

Let's see another group
http://beta.realtor.ca/propertyDetai...rtyId=13836406

http://beta.realtor.ca/propertyDetai...rtyId=13650393

http://beta.realtor.ca/propertyDetai...rtyId=13778281

I've been in those, they're not 2,000 sq. ft.

They're certainly not 15% bigger than this two storey SFH.
http://beta.realtor.ca/propertyDetai...rtyId=13865175

Nor do I believe this house (below) is bigger than the above by 33%
http://beta.realtor.ca/propertyDetai...rtyId=13865175

And that's literally the first two condo projects I looked at (as they had multiple listings, and the first neighborhood I looked for SFH listings (because Tuscany always has 1,000s of listings).

[lorenavedon]

Canada needs an actual useful search site like Zillow.