Interview with Dan Sanchez,
Managing Partner of ApartmentComps.com
Q -What does www.ApartmentComps.com
do?
A -"In only 3 mouse clicks,
ApartmentComps.com provides the results of property specific
rent surveys online, across the country. Over 1 million
Sunbelt apartment units are in our system. A user simply
enters a partial property name, address or intersection.
The next thing they see is a map of the 20 closest properties
to that location. On that page, they can click any property
to get detailed information including rents, amenities,
zip-code level demographics and in some cases tax records."
Q-Who are your subscribers?
A-"Our information is
packaged for a very niche audience: multifamily professionals
that conduct business across the country. Our customers
include management companies, real estate brokers, lenders,
appraisers and investors."
Q-Why is this useful
to them?
A-"Frequently these people
are presented with opportunities with very limited information
all over the country. As a broker I have wasted a lot
of time investigating deals that might be for sale, only
to find out that the neighborhood wasn't suitable or that
the market rents were too high for the subject property.
With our system you can find out all this in only 3 mouse
clicks"
Q-Why not use one of
the rental listing sites for this?
A-"Try it and see, if
you have the patience. Their information is presented
in a way that is useful for their audience of renters.
It would typically take 30 minutes or more to get something
from Springstreet that would be comparable to our offering,
which you can get in 30 seconds from us! We also have
demographics and some tax record data. Furthermore, if
a subscriber can't find his subject property, our staff
will try to get online for him within 24 hours. We want
to be the person in that other market that you would ordinarily
call for this information prior to working on a deal,
except you don't have to play 'phone tag' with us!"
Q-How can you respond
to users directly like this? It must be very difficult.
A-"People have asked
me this before. I would like to say that we care about
our customers more than other Internet companies, but
I think the real reason is that our system was designed
for Internet from the beginning. Our data never touches
the ground. Our researchers enter the data directly into
a database server that is concurrently being accessed
by our users. This make it very easy for them to stop
what they are doing and enter a property for a specific
user. We are happy to do it because it helps us create
a more robust and better database. I think other companies
have a difficult time doing this simply because they are
working on an old fashioned infrastructure."
Q-Why don't you make
your information available to renters; you already have
the information they need?
A-"Well that is a good
question. Renters need the information formatted in a
way that is useful to them. As you have seen, brokers
and renters have entirely different needs. Having said
that, we are considering offering a renter search page.
I don't understand why properties should have to pay to
have their information on the internet when companies
such as mine already have the same information required
to offer to renters and could offer it free as a service
to our management company friends who participate in our
surveys. We are still considering how this may work."
Q-How does your pricing
compare to your competition?
A-"We really don't have
any competition. REIS reports just starting offering a
similar product for which they charge $79 per month and
is very difficult to use. RealFacts on the West Coast
offers a very good CD-ROM product, which is also more
expensive and requires software installation. We are actually
offering big discounts right now to encourage people to
test drive our system Vs REIS."
Q-Since your system is
less money than the competition it also must be hard to
use, right?
A-"Our system is easy
to use because it was designed by real estate professionals
for real estate professionals. Too many sites require
input from the user, which is not necessary. For instance,
apartmentcomps.com allows partial property names or partial
addresses. Our programmers expended the effort to do this
for the users. We have focused on getting professionals
relevant answers in 3 mouse clicks."
Q-Tell us about the special
you are offering for readers of Bison Tales?
A-"Users currently have
FREE access to the 'lite' version of our site through
www.bisonfinancial.com/special/AptCompsFrame.html . Readers
of Bison Tales that want to upgrade to the premium site
can click a link from the Bison site and save 17% off
the regular price."
About the Interview
Dan Sanchez is the managing
partner of www.ApartmentComps.com one of the Internet's
premier information service providers for real estate
professionals. He is a licensed real estate broker that
has closed $250 million of real estate transactions in
9 markets over the past 11 years. Dan can be contacted
at dsan@apartmentcomps.com.
