Consumers Turning to Internet to Find Homes

We at Homescape decided to conduct a consumer survey to learn more about today’s online users and better understand how they use the Internet for their home buying and selling needs. We posted the survey on our homepage during the first two weeks of April and had 744 respondents; 535 of them answered all of the questions. Inspired by the survey’s successful response rate, we will continue to track the growing trends and improve our methods to help consumers with their home selling and buying needs.

Here are some of the survey highlights:

Background information
• 93.7% of respondents described themselves as consumers.
• 80% own a single family home.
• 61% currently own their own property (condo or raw land).
• 42% live in a small town or midsize city.
• 35.7% are first-time home buyers.
• 27% live in a suburb of a large city.

Demographics
• 58% of respondents are female.
• 42% are male.
• Age breakdown:
o 23% are 45-54 years old.
o 21% are 55-64 years old.
o 20% are 35-44 years old.
o 17% are 25-34 years old.
o 13% are 65 and older.
o 6% are 25 and younger.

Home buying and selling
• Why were online users looking for a new home?
o 29% said they were changing careers and relocating.
o 26% were tired of their current homes.
o 20% were downsizing.
o 17% were upgrading to accommodate a growing family.
o 5% were getting married.
o 3% were graduating college.

• Other key findings:
o 85% of respondents were considering working with an agent to assist them in their home search.
o 65% were using the services of a real estate agent to sell their current home.
o 47.6% were planning to buy a home within 6 months, while 28.3% said they wanted to buy within 1 to 3 months.

Internet usage
• How often in an average month did respondents visit a real estate or related Web site?
o 50.3% said they visited real estate sites 1-2 times a month.
o 29.3% visited real estate sites 5 or more times a month.
o 20.4% visited real estate sites 3-4 times a month.

• What did respondents want to do online?
o 77.7% said they were looking for homes for sale.
o 31.3% were looking for neighborhood information.
o 10.6% were looking for advice on home buying, selling and financing.

And the finding that made us all smile was:
86% of respondents said they would recommend Homescape.com to a friend or relative.