Looking for property in the Asheville MLS (Multiple Listing Service) can be frustrating.  We wanted it to be easy, and we wanted more people to actually find what they were looking for during an Asheville real estate search.   Since the launch of our new site and the Asheville MLS search feature this summer, we’ve gotten great feedback on the new search page.  Here is a little peek into our design process.

After brainstorming within the Bourke Group office, analyzing other real estate web sites, and torturing all our spouses with the different search pages we found, here is what we came up with:

1. It has to be free.  Forced registration is not free.
2. It should appear to be simple.
3. A short version should be accessible from other pages on our site.
4. It needs a great layout.  Results and search controls should go together on one page.
5. People should see what the boundaries of their property search are.
6. Landlords and other non-typical buyers should be able to get meaningful results from a search.
7. The Asheville MLS results must be fast and accurate.
8. We need to use an existing MLS vendor to keep design costs down.

With these ideas in hand, we set about building an Asheville property search tool that accomplished our goals.

We stopped requiring any form of registration prior to getting search results and settled on a list of common search features that would always display.  This meant we would not have an advanced search page - instead, we’d build enough of those advanced search features into the form that any user could get meaningful results.

By far the trickiest part of the design was the layout.  After using lots of other forms, we decided that the best searches happen when you can quickly refine your search after seeing the results in the same window.  This allows our visitors to change a search without leaving the page, a big benefit in usability.  Thus while most real estate sites have you fill out a form on one page and see the results on another, on our site they are side by side.

We also decided to stick with an existing MLS vendor - in this case Listingware - to keep costs down.  There are a lot of benefits to building a completely custom search that would talk directly to the MLS, but, in the end, the cost of that approach is high.  By using a vendor like Listingware we were able to focus on the layout and forms - money well spent - without having to talk to the MLS database itself, since that’s what Listingware does.  As another plus, as Lisitngware improves their search product, those changes show up automatically in our search results.  They recently created a series of new iTunes-like layouts for flipping through the results, and we got the benefit of those new features without having to write any new code (Look for the blue icons top right of the search results).

We think you’ll like our Asheville real estate search tool and welcome your input.  What can we do to make your searches work even better?

– Clark Mackey, Sparkdog

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