markgalloway.com

I just discovered today that Overstock.com now has a real estate category.  Though I haven’t had a chance to dive right in and spend a lot of time with it, it’s interesting nonetheless. 

Most noteworthy is that you can search for listings categorized as follows:

• All Classifieds
• Distressed
• Foreclosure
• Auction and
• Online Auctions

This is a very comprehensive list and an ideal way to delineate between listing types.  When I get a chance, I’ll tear into it and try to figure out how well it actually works, as well as see if I can tell what the source of the listing information is.  The user interface looks familiar, in a Trulia sort of way, but I don’t think Trulia is feeding them through their API. This has been bugging me too much to wait. I’m pretty sure Vast is feeding Overstock. Still could be interesting…..

Here’s a screenshot though:

From the perspective of a real estate investor, this could be a very appealing offering from a reputable ecommerce giant. Though I have to admit, this is only slightly less weird than Wal-Mart jumping into the real estate listings field last week!  Of course, Wal-Mart’s listings are just coming from Oodle. 

Don’t be surprised to see every commercial Tom, Dick, and Harry getting into the listing aggregation business in the future!

Tags: realestate, overstock, vast, oodle, listings