According to Hitwise, consumer Internet searches for the terms "real estate bubble" and "housing bubble" reached a 12-month high the week ending May 28, 2005. The market share of these terms across all major search engines like Google, Yahoo! Search, MSN Search and others, skyrocketed 311 percent and 174 percent respectively versus the prior week.
Visits to real estate sites increased into the spring and early summer of 2005, grew an average of three percent each week. The market share of total Internet visits for real estate sites is up 19 percent the week ending June 11, 2005 versus year-ago. As speculation over a U.S. real estate bubble continues in the mainstream media, new Internet search behavior data suggest consumers are equally concerned that the current market is overpriced.
"Increased traffic on real estate sites is reflective of the sector's growing adoption of Web-based technologies and databases," said Bill Tancer, Vice President of Research at Hitwise. "Still, recent Internet search activity suggests that some activity in the category is being driven by curiosity of rising property values and the possibility of a bursting bubble."
Income a factor:
Hitwise clickstream data for the four weeks ending June 11 reveal that:
Once on a real-estate site:
Top 10 Real Estate Web Sites Week ending June 11, 2005 | ||
Rank | Domain | Market Share |
1 | www.realtor.com | 12.29% |
2 | www.rentnet.com | 5.50% |
3 | www.homegain.com | 3.06% |
4 | www.rent.com | 2.68% |
5 | realestate.yahoo.com | 2.02% |
6 | www.realtytrac.com | 1.80% |
7 | www.remax.com | 1.70% |
8 | www.apartments.com | 1.69% |
9 | www.century21.com | 1.68% |
10 | houseandhome.msn.com | 1.42% |
Source: Hitwise.com, June 2005 |
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