Google Street View enhances property buyers’ online experience

Following today’s launch of Google Street View in South Africa, RE/MAX of Southern Africa, in partnership with local web application development specialists White Wall Web, have become the first Real Estate franchise in SA to fully integrate this technology into their website.

Google Street View is a service linked to Google Maps and Google Earth that provides users with panoramic, photographic detail at street level. Areas in Cape Town, Port Elizabeth, Pretoria, Johannesburg and Durban were mapped out by stitching together millions of photographs taken by the Google Street View Trikes (vehicles), enabling users to view panoramic images of local streets in vivid detail, as if they were standing on the very street they were viewing. Users visiting www.remax.co.za can now see the ‘Street View’ of specific properties listed on the site.

A huge value-add to property consumers, this opens the doors to many ancillary benefits which are soon to be exploited, but most significantly, buyers are afforded an improved perspective on the properties in question, and sellers are better able to recoup the intrinsic value of appealing neighbourhoods, attractive houses and proximity to amenities such as educational institutions, shopping areas and police stations. Adrian Goslett, CEO of RE/MAX of Southern Africa says, “Each year an increased number of South Africans are searching online for property, so the implementation of Google Street View to our service is the natural progression.”

The benefits of Google Street View to clients are vast as they will no longer need to page through newspapers or drive around on Sundays, painstakingly searching for show houses.

Prior to the launch of Google Street View in South Africa, Google SA approached White Wall Web and RE/MAX as potential integration partners for Street View as a result of their long standing relationship building and innovating web-based technologies for the property industry. Google Street View subsequently became the ‘cherry on top’ for the newly launched www.remax.co.za website, which features address level map data as well.

Executive Director at White Wall Web, Noel Ross-Gillespie, states, “The incorporation of Google Street View into the RE/MAX of Southern Africa website is a big step in the right technological direction. While South Africa might be behind the rest of the developed world in some aspects, we’re also in a unique position in which we can take the best-of-breed technologies and fast-track our growth. We are pleased to have been able to assist RE/MAX in bringing the very latest technology to the forefront of the Real Estate industry.”