The Frequently Asked Questions we get in person
The Estately team ends up explaining what we do to people – we’re small and we don’t have the name recognition that millions of dollars of venture capitol will bring you. People always seem to ask a few of the same questions though:
Q. How are you different than, uh, what’s it called, uh, Zillow?
A. We have nearly every home that is for sale in Washington and we have tons of local information to let you know what is nearby every home. Estately is a member of the North West MLS so there are over 45,000 Western Washington homes for sale on Estately, while there are only about 150,000 for sale nationwide on Zillow. If you’re looking to buy a home, you should look on Estately or you might miss the best one for you.
Q. So are you like Redfin?
A. In some ways we are: like Redfin, we have an innovative map search interface and we use the comprehensive database of MLS listings. But in some ways we aren’t: we have loads of local information about every home in our database, including which bus and transit stops are nearby, which parks and schools are nearby. We also have information about every neighborhood and city in Western Washington (and pictures for many!). We also have unique search features like text search (‘hardwood floors’ anyone?), “transit search” (don’t like driving to work?) and true area search so you can narrow your search to only the homes in or near the neighborhood you’re interested in. But the biggest difference is that we don’t employ real estate agents. There are so many great real estate agents with years of experience out there (and many more mediocre ones!) that we decided the best way we could help people buy and sell homes and get the hyper-local advice and support they need was to match them with great agents in their area through Estately Agent Match.
Q. How many people work at Estately?
A. There are two of us.
Q. You mean like two business people and a bunch of developers?
A. Nope. Two of us. We both work on strategy, coding and our feature roadmap. Galen does most of the design and the interviews and Doug works on the heavy lifting code tasks. We have both interview real estate agents for Agent Match.
Q. What’s next?
A. Our road map is chalk full of great features, some continuing to focus on finding a home (our specialty!) and some that continue to extend our mission (making finding, buying and selling a home easier). Our most recent innovation, Agent Match, is along those lines: once you’re ready for expert help, we recommend great agents who really know the area and can meet your needs.
