How to look for your next property online

As both the number of online house hunters and the number of online sources of property information continue to grow, providing proper guidance in using the Internet in the most advantageous way becomes more and more important. To help house hunters get to grips with the online property maze, Home.co.ukhas built a comprehensive property search for the UK to enable house hunters to harness the real power of the Internet and access the vast majority of UK homes for sale from just one site.

The rapid growth of the Internet over the last 10 years has forever changed the way people buy and sell residential property. In the UK around 80% of house hunters now use the Web to start their search for property. In fact, according to traffic statistics expert Hitwise, around 1% of ALL internet traffic in the UK is property-related. The majority of this traffic is due to home hunters executing property searches on portals and contacting estate agents. Altogether, the top four property portals - Rightmove, Primelocation, Findaproperty and Zoopla - entertain 16+ million user sessions per month. These figures serve to show how enormously popular online property searches have become, but are users searching effectively?

Traditional House Hunting

Before the Internet, home hunters were limited to traditional media such as local newspapers and there they would see properties advertised by various local estate agents. They may also have visited the offices of their local estate agents on the high street and added their name to the mailing lists. Ideally, one would contact all the estate agents in a given locality. This tedious and time-intensive process is exactly what home hunters hope to avoid by using the Internet in their quest to find properties for sale that match their needs.

Online House Hunting

In the UK around one million residential properties change hands every year. By using the Internet, home hunters can potentially reduce the time spent looking for properties that match their requirements, and house hunting can be done from work or home. Using Internet searches as the main tool to guide you through the property maze enables you to stay in control throughout the process and make sure you get the best deals available. However, despite the obvious benefits from house hunting using the Internet, there are several factors that potential buyers should be aware of.