WordPress and Open Source for Realtors

Posted on August 15, 2008
Filed Under General |

The UltimateIDX adds FREE WordPress Plug-in to inventory

The UltimateIDX (UltimateRETS) which is owned by The Brokers Edge added a new tool for putting its UltimateIDX Featured Listings directly into your WordPress blog. Similar in some ways as the WP Featured plug-in, the UIDX version is designed for people who use the UltimateIDX CRM system in their real estate WordPress blog.

For those who don’t know, The UltimateIDX is a full blown client resource and contact management system built specifically by broker guided programmers for Real Estate Agents, Brokers and Offices. Motivated in part by the industries consistent and growing frustration with proprietary solutions, The Brokers Edge recognized the massive migration of Real Estate professionals to open source solutions like WordPress, Joomla, Drupal and others when they set out to build this masterpiece. This is where the plug-in fits the bill for maximizing a Realtors marketing efforts.

The WordPress plug-in takes UIDX MLS listings and puts a featured block in the sidebar or directly into your WordPress posts and pages. The criteria and sort method is all template tag controlled and provides Realtors who love to blog a way of displaying listings in their content to better enhance their marketing efforts.

Only the arrogant would call this exclusive. Other competing services are likely to copy this plug-in feature for their own solutions I can almost guarantee it but, UltimateIDX is not so easy to replicate as the project has been a lofty endeavor with facets to long to list here. I told members in our forum that I’d venture a wager against my own “self proclaimed insight” into this industry that if a competing plug-in does not surface with other providers in the next few months then I clearly have no clue about this industry. My gut feeling says, given the traffic to my own plug-in and the IP tracking we have done watching competitors visit the sites, most of us are convinced that the decision UltimateIDX made by providing this (and other) plug-ins to Realtors was a wise one.

One of its most clever features is that the UltimateIDX does NOT require you to iFrame in the MLS listings and it does not require quirky looking sub-domains or other types of hack ins that similar products often do. Now in my business I don’t seek to disparage any particular product on the market, but if I were a Realtor, I’d certainly consider the option to be free from proprietary costly solutions and opt in instead for one that works with tools I like to use, like Joomla for instance.

The UltimateIDX - UltimateRETS with Joomla, WordPress and even OpenRealty

It is the single most impressive feature about UltimateIDX in my opinion. The ability to take this clever system and plug it into literally ANY existing website that is at least “basically” standards compliant in design. That means Joomla integration with the RETS or IDX isn’t a problem, even WordPress and IDX or Rets wont hold you up. Just weeks ago, I tested it in an OpenRealty setting and again, not a hitch to be found.

The ability for the UltimateIDX to be plugged into any website with key features like SEF URL’s and awesome lead management abilities makes the UltimateIDX an ideal solution for true real estate professionals. You package this baby up in recognition of the steady trend of Realtors migrating away from proprietary solutions to those that are open source, you end up with a product that actually liberates the Realtor with a myriad of options. The UltimateIDX works with open source like bacon does with eggs. Toss in the plug-in and now you have the added bonus of a hot cup of coffee.

But is UltimateIDX only about open source? Not at all! UltimateIDX sought to work with these solutions knowing that Realtors were likely to gravitate to open source in part because open source is widely supported, less expensive, more compliant and often better built than proprietary solutions but open source is NOT the only market for UltimateIDX. As mentioned above UltimateIDX works with any existing website solution providing the site is at least basically standards compliant and can work on a Linux or LAMP type server (although not exclusively required.). That means home grown websites too, like those built with Dreamweaver or maybe something as simple as a MS Front Page website. UIDX isn’t limited to other peoples technologies by and large.

WordPress Featured Listings too WordPress Realty

My pet project was my little plug-in called WP Featured which was a way for me to answer Realtors needs to put MLS and IDX listings in their WordPress content via an easy to use template tag to feature those listings. But taking off from that, a programmer decided that he can do better. So, he built the CMSRealty for Joomla equivalent for WordPress but with full support for WordPress permalinks and its called WordPress Realty or WP Realty for short.

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4 Comments so far
  1. James Boyer Morristown NJ August 18, 2008 8:07 pm

    Very good Jared. I would be interested in such capabilities if I had a friendlier MLS. They will allow us to display IDX data on one domain only. Get caught with your feed on more then one domain and you lose your feed for good, so they say.

  2. Jared Ritchey August 18, 2008 9:01 pm

    Jim is that market that restrictive. I mean I thought the Cincinnati MLS was foolish in the way they actually punish a person for being a Realtor but I figured it was something exclusive.

    Sorry to hear that some MLS’s make it hard for agents to do business.

    P.S. Good to see you again and Yes I allow DO-FOLLOW in my comment links.

    ~ Jared

  3. Heather McCroan September 23, 2008 4:22 pm

    Jared … I am so appreciative of your blog. It has helped me in my research for my client. My only concern is that when I visit http://www.TheBrokersEdge.com I find that their website is … well … not really well put together and some of the links don’t work. When I click on Tools, I can’t access any of the links. This makes me a little leery of a company when their own site isn’t really up to par.

    My other question … UltimateIDX/RETS is an IDX provider, correct? You still have to build out your WordPress site and the IDX gets integrated into your site. Do I understand that correctly?

    If you were to choose between a WordPress/Open Realty site and WordPress/UltimateIDX, which would you choose?

  4. Jared Ritchey Design » WP Realty and EZProRealty October 8, 2008 12:05 pm

    [...] So I stress that although my blog posts about plugin and addon announcements in absence of a few actual plugins does in fact really annoy people; its important to note that I release all of my plugins as free items. I really love the open source market and need to be careful to see if my plans are worth a damn or not so I test the waters. After all I am the guy paying the bill to give away free products and some times I get an angel offering to fund the development to speed up the process which really helps. During this time people are certain to copy the ideas and even take our base code and complete it. I’ve said this in a previous post that such things are almost a guarantee; Only the arrogant would call this exclusive. Other competing services are likely to copy this plug-i… [...]


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