HREO.com has been the Hamptons’ multiple listings site for, well, just about forever. We found our own home on HREO back in 1998, as a matter of fact. But almost twenty years later, the site hadn’t changed all that much. Then a year ago, HREO was sold along with the pro site RealNet and Open RealNet Exchange (OREX), the underlying distribution software, to StreetEasy as part of Zillow Group.
In the past year, StreetEasy refreshed and updated HREO while reading its all-new portal, Out East, which goes live today. Out East looks great–it’s no longer a legacy of a 90s website. Most importantly, it offers extremely helpful new functionality, such as the ability to save searches. It also looks great on mobile.
Matt Daimler, Vice President of Strategic Initiatives at the Zillow Group, told us that when he and his team began to reimagine HREO, they sought to define what made the Hamptons unique. The result of what Matt calls the “hyper-local” approach means that, for example, when searching for a property by the water, you can specify “waterfront” versus “oceanfront.” Search results are shown on a handy map.
After you click on a listing, other useful information, such as distance to beaches and transportation, is available. Super-useful.
There are also town guides, with market stats updated in real time–as Matt explained, taking into account the unique nature of the Hamptons, with a rental period for MD-LD, unlike the vast majority of rentals in other areas–
as well as guides to local amenities.
You can also save listings and be updated in real time regarding changes to the listing, such as a price cut. If a listing is a co-exclusive or tri-exclusive, too, the property page will note that–something that is extremely useful for rentals which are often open listings.
What do you think? Let us know in the comments.
