Today Google announced and launched a pretty amazing new feature to Google maps. The Street view.
You may be asking yourself, how do they take a satellite picture from that angle… uhhh yeah… it’s not a satellite photo. Google has broken out of the mold and has hit the streets apparently with the help of a company called Immersive. As you can see from the video and pics it is a pretty amazing tool. They currently only have 5 cities available, but I’m sure there are more to come. So far it’s:Miami, San Francisco, Denver, New York City, and Las Vegas
Joel Burslem points out on the Inman blog that it will have a “great application” in real estate, but I’m not so sure yet… After playing around with it for a while and considering the markets available, and the cities themselves, I see very little value for the residential marketplace. Sure, it is a great tool, but how much residential area is actually represented? It may have value in New York and San Francisco, as there are many city dwellers, but personally, I don’t see it as being practical.
If they bundled it into their current map API, it may be useful, but I don’t think we’re going to see an immediate stampede to use the technology by real estate agents… at least not yet.
15 Comments
on Google Launches the "Street View" - Can it be used for Real Estate???
MAY
30
2007
Amazing! Thanks for the information. And, of course this can be great for real estate. What a wonderful free tool to see what a neighborhood looks like with out putting any miles on your car.
Justin- I tried to play with it a little bit and was unable to get anywhere. I'll keep working at it. Ultimately, it could be very useful. I know Denver has lots of traffic cameras that are real time, I'm just not sure you can access them anywhere.
Sounds amazing. I read somewhere that there is a site that can tell you of available parking spot in New York. I am not sure they have started yet.They probably use the same technology.
Justin ~ This is spooky. I actually found my office just off of Colorado Blvd. My hubby just said, " I find it amazing that somebody is taking pictures of everything. Somebody (Google) has Too Much Money!"
Great info and thqanks for sharing this cool new feature - it will be interested to see how we can integrate it into real estate websites, and the IDX solutions :o)
I think this is great for largely populated areas, but like you, I'm not sure how much use it will have in the smaller areas. I think it's an awesome concept, but the big cities will be the winners with it.
We shall see how long it takes them to do the whole Tampa Bay area. I imagine it will be quite some time and it is a huge area to cover. This could take forever before it is functional for everyone.
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