Neighborhood Archetypes like Zodiac Signs
Issue 7 - November 20th, 2020
In continuing my theme from last week's newsletter on lifestyle-based home searching, I have another idea to explore in today's newsletter around "neighborhood archetypes". If you love a particular neighborhood where you live now, and if you are considering moving to a new city or even just another home in your city then wouldn't it be helpful to have a "neighborhood archetype" definition for the various areas you are considering to move?
Let's say you live in San Francisco in the Outer Sunset. You absolutely love your neighborhood, and you are being transferred to Orlando, Florida in a few months to take a new job position. You are thrilled at the new career opportunity, but you are petrified at the thought of having to re-learn an entirely new city and neighborhood. Imagine if you could visit my (currently) fictitious lifestyle based home search tool, and then look up neighborhood archetypes for similar neighborhoods to Outer Sunset in SF?
This would be your Zodiac Sign in a sense for your ideal neighborhood. If you are not certain on what neighborhood type best suits you, then you could take a personality-like quiz and identify your neighborhood archetype. You could search online for that specific archetype once the "neighborhood archetype" metric is so mainstream it appears in real estate listings! In the future, real estate agents will ask their clients, "What's your neighborhood archetype?".
If you were curious, I am a Leo. Have a good weekend.
Newsworthy Links To Share
Department Of Justice has sued The National Association of Realtors, alleging illegal restraints on REALTOR competition. “Home buyers and sellers should be aware of all the broker fees they are paying,” Delrahim added. “Today’s settlement prevents traditional brokers from impeding competition — including by internet-based methods of home buying and selling — by providing greater transparency to consumers about broker fees. This will increase price competition among brokers and lead to better quality of services for American home buyers and sellers.” Read more HERE.
From the NY Times: "Zillow Surfing Is the Escape We All Need Right Now". Zillow surfing has become a hobby during 2020 even for people with zero intention of moving. Search traffic on the site is up over 50% from last year, and a lot of people admit it is just a form of escapism from their everyday life. Bill Gurley, one of the top venture capitalists in our country, tweeted this out yesterday as well: "Learned that my daughter & friends have a game where they pick a town, a budget, & a pretend station in life. They then compete to see who can find the "very best" Zillow home/rental. Great way to learn about mortgages, rent, cost of living, etc." Read more HERE.
Hover raises $60 million to streamline home inspections with computer vision. "Its apps have hundreds of thousands of users representing tens of thousands of home improvement companies, and Hover — which expects to finish 2020 with a $70 million run rate — claims it works with five of the top 10 U.S. insurance carriers, who use its technology to reduce claim adjusting costs, decrease cycle times, and improve the overall customer experience. For instance, Hover says it’s able to provide a roof square estimate and total living area within 30 minutes of capturing photos." Read more HERE.
Online notary, Notarize, opens platform to more notaries, launches tool for agents. "Kinsel revealed that volume on Notarize’s platform has increased “6x since April 1” and that the company is now doing more than $7 billion in real estate closings every month." Read more HERE.
Barcelona, Spain is redesigning 21 downtown streets to prioritize people, not cars. In central Barcelona, one in three streets will soon become “green axes” that prioritize people on foot and bikes instead of cars. On those streets, 21 intersections will be converted to public squares, so no one in the area is more than around 650 feet from a small park. Read more HERE.