Internet as a Powerful Tool of Realtors, Developers and Investors in the 21 st Century

In Russia intensive development of Internet technologies began in 1998 Ò 2000. Almost at the same time a new tide of mass scale housing construction evolved in Moscow region. According to some estimates, an annual assets turnover in the housing sector amounts to $8 billion. All this led to a boom in development of a new IT area - Real Estate Internet, which main aspects and results are considered in this paper. The Real Estate Internet focus lies in two areas: development and realtor business. Presently the most advanced websites generate up to 15% of apartment sales from realtors. Entering the market by a large development project with no supporting website is considered an absolute nonsense. The paper in its first part reviews approaches and developments of most recent years that have been successfully applied in advertisement and promotion of apartments and houses, and also marketing of brands of corporations and housing units in the market. The second part deals with quantitative analysis of efficiency of a realtor-investment companyÌs corporate site as a sales means in trading apartments. Statistical data are given of the site impact on the number of a) calls to the office by potential clients; b) visits (demonstrations) of apartments by clients, and c) transactions. The analysis of time rows and regression analysis of the resulted data has shown a qualitative difference of the Real Estate Internet as a marketing tool from other advertising and commodity promotion methods that are currently used in the market. In the summary the main findings are considered from the prospects of development of a most effective strategy for Internet support of realtors and development companies; a multifaceted effect of the Real Estate Internet on clients is demonstrated; quantitative projections are given for a short-term develop.