There’s nowhere to go but up. When population is rising and when land options are spreading thin, the only way to go is up. Condominiums, high-rises, low-rises. It’s time for us to reach the skies. But the sky is not an easy target to reach. We say that the sky’s the limit, but we need to see how far the sky goes. It’s hard to scout for the perfect condo. We’re trouble by a torrential downpour of real estate listings and frothy marketing schemes. Either we’re faced with incomplete information or marketing that fluffs up a property to hide the problems within.
More and more people are looking for homes online. But not all information is available or reliable. Not even the brokers or even the owners are perfectly reliable. This is the problem targeted by ZipMatch.com, a real estate portal based in Taguig. Founded in 2012 by Chow Paredes and John Dang, the real estate start-up does all the research for the buyers. It has recently released a platform known as “Explore.”
Explore is so named because it allows interested home buyers to explore every inch and detail of property developments across the country from the convenience of their personal computers, laptops, or mobile phones. It is a comprehensive platform for researching about a selected property. Features include:
Property overview. All properties collated by ZipMatch will be listed along with key details, features, amenities, and policies. From something as basic as who is developing the property to something as overlooked and tiny as the property’s Internet provider and policy on bringing pets. Users can also see which units are available for sale or rent.
Property reviews. All reviews are crowdsourced. Besides reviews by ZipMatch’s scout team, other users can also start the conversation by providing reviews, which bring to light insights which may not normally be uncovered by a thorough research. For instance, maybe the sun shines directly on the condo at a certain time of day or a security guard often walks up and down the floor like a constant patrol.
360° virtual tour. No comprehensive research about a property is complete without knowing what it actually looks like. Explore offers a full 360-degree tour of the major areas in a property, from the actual room to the swimming pool out back. Think Google Maps Street View. And these aren’t just marketing photos provided by the developer. These are actual shots taken by the ZipMatch scout team. These are real and candid photos. You can even spy the construction going on if the property you’re researching is still under construction.
Location overview. An interesting feature of Explore is seeing the points of interest like groceries, malls, drugstores, and restaurants which surround a property. The feature is used like Google Maps with a customizable radius laid out around the property. Besides points of interest, the radius can also cover other listed properties if in case the selected property just doesn’t cut it.
Developer overview. Explore doesn’t just look for properties. It also researches on the developer to provide users with its background and history in real estate.
Once researched, users can contact ZipMatch directly and a consultant will provide more details which the user may need. If the user decides to buy, ZipMatch will take him or her through the entire buying process.
ZipMatch has released Explore Taguig and Explore Makati. In the upcoming months, Explore Mandaluyong, Explore Quezon City, and Explore Pasig will be rolled out. By the end of 2015, ZipMatch says to expect Explore to be available for the whole Philippines.
What a great write-up!