First Look: CoStar Launches Citysnap in New York

It’s been a long time coming, and it’s been worth the wait. Citysnap, CoStar’s New York City based portal has finally arrived. And it looks great.

Promising “the most comprehensive and accurate residential real estate database in all of New York City”, CitySnap is built on up-to-the minute real estate data from over 600 participating brokerage firms and 12,000 New York City member agents.

Here are some of the features Online Marketplaces likes from what we've seen so far:

Market Stats

Citysnap includes market stats for each of NYC's neighbourhoods, including the average time a residential unit stays on the market before being let/sold, and total number of listings recently published.

Transport Links

Each listing has its own section dedicated to transport links. The visuals are clean and easy to understand.

Maps, maps, maps

The interactive map is a big plus. It lets users draw their favoured areas freehand, with search results limited to the drawn area.

Property Histories

This is a good one. Citysnap shows when the property was last rented, and publicises its price. Users also have an option to receive an alert should the price change.

Message the Agent

Citysnap tells its users who the listing agent(s) is (are), and also has the option to message the agent to ask specific questions. A nice touch.

Sky Cam

No NYC portal is complete without a sense of the scale of the city. The Sky Cam feature shows exactly where each listing sits in the city, including a rotating 360 degree view of the surrounding area.

But... We're still waiting for the app

Meanwhile, Citysnap's app remains under wraps. Users can pre-register for the app, which will automatically download once it goes live.

Final Thoughts

Citysnap has been talked about a lot in recent months, and its arrival marks a big step for CoStar, which remains focused on catching up to rival Zillow. Citysnap begins life as a New York City-only portal, but CoStar intends on expanding its reach across the US in the future.

The portal looks great, has all the features required to compete in a competitive marketplace, and has some nice surprises that we didn't expect to see. The search functions are comprehensive and intuitive, while the interactive map in particular is a welcome addition.