Two New Richistani Real Estate Sites Launch

New York Times writer Robert Frank recently wrote a book about America’s wealthy class, Richistan: A Journey Through the American Wealth Boom and the Lives of the New Rich. Two new websites have sprung up to service just that crowd, specifically catering to individuals looking for second homes.

Like many real estate web companies, the company behind these two new products (SecondSpace ) is based out of Washington state. They have raised over $6 million in funding and have hired from many of the local web companies to fill their ranks.

LandWatch
If your idea of a second home is in a rural setting, then LandWatch is a good place to start. I would compare it most closely with Lands of America, but with a more affluent clientèle in mind. It has an interesting mix of rural homesteads, retreats and hunting land.

ResortScape
Billed as the place to “explore the world of vacation homes and lifestyle communities and discover the place of your dreams”, ResortScape offers a variety of luxury condos, lifestyle communities and vacation homes for those looking to spend their disposable income. They’ve done a nice job of layout and integration of Microsoft mapping into each listing.

Honestly, I didn’t realize that there was a need for this type of service. Perhaps wrongly, I assumed that you could search for condos, homes and communities on the current real estate search verticals already. Since their plan is to make money via advertising, they are dependent upon reaching a lot of potential eyeballs – specifically ones that end in a sale. Time will tell if a centralized second home portal is truly needed. With a CEO who has successes like Classmates.com and Verisign under his belt, I won’t argue.

Last Thoughts
Both sites are pretty well done. I like the niche-focus and the attraction that it can give to the specific demographic that they’re catering to. There are a few things that I think could make it better, especially since sales will be dependent upon the site attracting and feeding the imagination of potential property buyers:

• Bigger images – if you’re trying to sell property based on it’s visual appeal, make the pictures bigger.
• Video – why not partner with service providers like Online Walkthru or WellcomeMat for this?
• Plot overlays on the map – this is a simple addition to the current map view that shows the plot outlines. It would work especially well for LandWatch.
• Blogs – here is a great opportunity to harness blogging into niche content areas, own this space with dynamic content not just a portal.
• Basically, I want to dig deeper into a specific property online – help me do that.

(Via the New York Times)

[More insight at Transparent RE]