propertyfinder.com, one of the "big 4" property portals in the UK market, has just launched an iPhone version of its site.  The new mobile version allows users to quickly and easily search through all the listings in the propertyfinder.com database from their phone.   The new site can be found at m.propertyfinder.com.   The site seems to have been optimised to work on the iPhone.  Like the trulia.com iPhone application launched earlier this year, it is well designed, easy to used, has smooth graphics and appears relatively fast. propertyfinder.com appears to be one of the first portal sites in the UK

Australia's number 2 site, domain.com.au has just completed a content distribution deal with ebay.com.au that sees the launch of a new real estate section on ebay - ebay.domain.com.au. The new site will be linked from the home page of ebay and expose the new site to ebay's 5.4 million unique visitors per month. What this means is that anyone who clicks on the real estate link on ebay.com.au will see the listings from agents advertising on domain.com.au presented on a co-branded site. While this is good news for domain and will help boost traffic to their listings, it still wont

I recently wrote an article about how companies need to tighten their belts as time are tough and are likely to remain that way for some time.  Well it seems that well known US portal site Zillow is feeling the pressure and on Friday announced that they would be laying off 25% of their work force. On the company's blog, Rich Barton, the CEO, said "This was an incredibly painful decision for me and the leadership team, but, in the end, we concluded that we had no choice but to securely batten down the hatches as we sail into a

propertyfinder.ae, the UAE's leading property portal, has announced a partnership deal with maktoob.com, one of the Middle East's leading Arablic news portals with 9.6 million unique visitors each month. propertyfinder.ae is part of the REA Group and is entering strategic partnerships to help provide a growing regional audience with upto date real estate information and property listings from the UAE. "We are delighted to work in partnership with one of the leading Arabic news portal in the Middle East. Working with Maktoob.com will help take propertyfinder.ae to another level in terms of reach and accessibility and ability to meet regional

I just wanted to follow up on the article i wrote yesterday with some more thoughts on what property portal sites should do in the current financial crisis. I came across a presentation from Sequoia Capita on startups and the economic downturn.   The key messages are similar to the ones i wrote in the previous article however they have gone into more depth and i thought i would summarise them here for everyone. Here are the key messages: The recovery will be long - dont expect a quick turn around There are new realities - raising money on high speculative

The credit crunch and the collapse of the financial markets can only mean one thing - the days of easy access to funding is well and truly over.  In a recent article on cnet titled "VC's throw cold water on portfolio companies", VC's and angel investors are giving their portfolio companies a clear message - prepare for the worst. So what sort of preparation as they talking about?  They are suggesting cutting marketing costs, reducing G&A costs and even laying off staff.  The way angel investor Ron Conway put it in a letter to his portfolio companies is "This is the

An Estate Agency Today story claims that 75% of agents are threatening to quit rightmove. The article stated "an astonishing 75.7% of agents who participated in the Estate Agent Today poll say they will not be renewing their annual subscriptions to Rightmove. A total of 1,230 votes have been cast so far. Of these, 931 (75.7%) say they will not renew while 299 (24.3%) say they will stay with the hugely successful portal, which claims a 90% share of the listings market." Now a couple of comments about the survey. Firstly, anyone can complete the survey - i did and

Believe it or not, there is another real estate site launching in the UK and it is called findsyou.com.  Now the site doesnt just serve the property market it also serves a range of other markets and has a different business model.  i thought i would try the site out and when i went there i was a little confused as to what i should do.  You are presented with a simple screen that really gives you two options - Buy (Seek - Want) and Sell (Supply - Provide).  So far so good.  So i click on buy to see

The UK's 14th most visited site (comScore August 2008), fish4homes.co.uk, has undergone a face lift.  The new site has been launched as part of an overall upgrade to the fish4 group of sites. Here is their press release: fish4 (www.fish4.co.uk) the parent company of www.fish4jobs.co.uk, www.fish4homes.co.uk, www.fish4cars.co.uk and www.fish4holidays.co.uk  has today launched its new site, following months of investment, research and redesign. The new site not only has a new design but is complimented with new functionality, offering the user a seamless journey around the four verticals. There are also plenty of new advertising opportunities for clients. New features include

In this month's financial comparison we can see that the down turn in the global market is having an impact on the listed property portal sites with their share prices down month on month.  The companies with a the biggest decline were move.com, seloger.fr, rightmove.co.uk and entreparticuliers.fr.  Some of these sites hit 12 month lows. It should also be noted that the movement in currencies has impacted the REA Group as the Australian dollar falls against the US$. Finally, it should be noted that while the share prices decrease for these companies, the underlying fundamentals continue to improve as they are