Our Broker is now offering this tool and thought we would pass it on...

Coldwell Banker isn't letting the nation's financial crisis get them down. Instead, they're debuting some innovative technology in the form of a customized online platform optimized for iPhone users. With their new iPhone-ready site available from iphone.coldwellbanker.com, you can perform real-time searches for homes or home values right from the palm of your hand. This launch makes Coldwell Banker the first full-service national real estate brand to launch a customized online platform just for the iPhone.

Although this iPhone "app" isn't a true app in the sense that you download it from the iTunes app store, it may as well be. This fully-functional home search tool is available to anyone who visits coldwellbanker.com from their iPhone. The web site will recognize that the visitor is using an iPhone and will redirect them to the new iPhone version of the site.

How It Works

From here, there are two tabs available: "Find Homes" and "Home Values." To look for a home, you can search by entering in criteria such as city, state, zip, minimum and maximum price, and number of beds and baths. You can also specify via checkboxes whether you want to see new listings only (new in the last 7 days) or open houses listed first.

The search results appear in an easy-to-read scrollable format that surprisingly manages to fit 8 per page. The listings show price, number of beds/baths, location, realtor, and even a photo. To see more information, you only need click the "View" button.

For anyone who has ever been house-hunting, you know that sometimes what you need isn't a set of listings, but a general idea as to whether the neighborhood you're touring is even in your price range. For that, there's the "Home Values" tab, which will display the prices of the homes in a certain address.