“Yes, the agent system can be an effective solution. Surprised we’d say that? Well, we’re not the ones with our heads in the sand. The question shouldn’t be whether or not their system provides good exposure but rather “why do I need to use their system?” it costs way too much. We’re an effective and low cost alternative to their system. Our system provides you with a level of exposure that we believe can eliminate the very need for using an agent. Our web site gets millions of hits a month and we send automated notifications to buyers looking for homes all across the country. By the way, agents also use our web site to find available properties for their customers.”

In regards to the Ranking.com stats I believe that ForSaleByOwner.com is an american company so that means that PropertyGuys.com is the most visited FSBO site in Canada and second only to MLS. That sure makes me feel like I spent my money wisely!

Your point, if I understand it correctly, is that Alexa.com does not necessarily give the most reliable web site traffic data.

I agree.

The point of this post was to show the _relative_ difference in traffic between MLS.ca and the other private sale web sites. This is because in my initial conversations with the local representative, as well as all of PropertyGuys’ literature, they represent their web site traffic as being “close” to that of MLS.ca.

Thank you for pointing out another traffic ranking site, Rankings.com. It’s encouraging to hear that the numbers are improving for private sales firms.

Again though, the point was to provide a relative comparison – or “apples to apples”. Doing this with Rankings.com yields the following on the date this is written:

“Web Rank” from Ranking.com
MLS.ca – 1053
ForSaleByOwner.com – 7017
PropertyGuys.com – 17,691
GreyBruceListings.com – Not Ranked

So, using this method for comparison, PropertyGuys.com still does not get anywhere near the traffic of MLS.ca.

“Gathering Web Usage Information
In addition to the Alexa Crawl, which can tell us what is on the Web, Alexa utilizes web usage information, which tells us what is being seen on the web. This information comes from the community of Alexa Toolbar users. Each member of the community, in addition to getting a useful tool, is giving back. Simply by using the toolbar each member contributes valuable information about the web, how it is used, what is important and what is not. This information is returned to the community with improved Related Links, Traffic Rankings and more.”

If you look at Ranking.com they say that PropertyGuys.com is 17,691 in overall web traffic. Seems pretty high but impressive because they have come up from 43,000th in a year. ByTheOwner.com is listed as 40,704th, an improvement because they came up from 192,000nd, but still well behind PropertyGuys.com. With out a doubt private sale is growing dramatically.

I have been listed for almost 2 weeks with PropertyGuys.com and have 476 hits on my page. I have also had one person present an offer. Unfortunately we were unable to come to an agreement.

Frank

I am currently listed with both bytheowner.com and propertyguys.com and have been listed for approx. 3 weeks. In my opinion, for the services offered, and the package prices quoted in my area, BTO has better value. Keep in mind that these package prices are sometimes negotiable, and one of my coworkers was able to get a free listing on one of these websites after he had listed with the other.

The web traffic to my listing has been fairly equal from both sites. The bytheowner.com “hit counter” is much more sophisticated and gives you information on new visitors versus repeat visitors, etc.. which is very handy to have. I will also say that my Kijiji ad gets hundreds more hits than either of those sites.

The representative I have at BTO.com is quite good, and also gave me a list of properties within a 1km radius that were recently sold – what their selling price actually was. I have never had an encounter with a BTO employee that wasn’t extremely positive.

The BTO website also has a forum where sellers can share their tips, woes and successes, and they have a licensed real estate agent on staff that often posts information and motivational tips.

I’ve known a few people who have listed on both sites and in general, most believe they are fairly equal in the success rates with respect to exposure. (ALL of the people I know who have listed on either of these sites have sold successfully within a reasonable amount of time.)

One thing to factor in is which site is more predominant in the area you are selling in. I happen to live in an area where propertyguys.com has many more listings than bto.com; therefore one may assume the web traffic to property guys is going to be a bit heavier. I listed with BTO because I like their website and their overall image, I listed with property guys because they are more popular in my area. I have only one sign on my lawn.

In areas like the niagara region, privaterealestate.ca is the top FSBO website, while the others – not so much. In Barrie, BTO is extremely popular. List with the predominant one in your area, but don’t stop at just one listing. There are many free FSBO websites: try homesbyowner.com, which offers a free package and their site actually carries across to oodle where all of the mls listings show up.

For the record, and as an aside, I have found print adverts to be a waste of money – the two days I had full colour picture ads in the paper were coincidentally the days I had the least amount of traffic to my sites.

Anyway, good luck with your sale and thanks for the blog – I’ll be watching it regularly to see what other information you can dig up.

Eric Hundin

Honestly, their sign in front of my house seemed to be much more useful than other things they provided. Serious buyers will drive by the area no matter what, and they will see your sign.

I like talking to realtors. I have been talking to more realtors in the past few weeks than the past years. Many are nice people, though I also met some dishonest ones.

I think realtors do provide valuable services, just that they charge too much (at least for me). Some people would need them for sure. As for me, I think I will never go back to hiring one in the rest of my life.

No I am not affiliated with the site, rather I am an internet marketer who stumbled onto your site somehow.

To find the connection I simply did a WHOIS search of the domain name privatesaleblog.ca:
http://www.internic.ca/whois.asp?domain=privatesaleblog.ca&wserver=whois.internic.ca

The owner made a choice to hide the personal contact information – however, the DNS servers and host names refer you to the joepro.com site which is found here:
http://www.internic.ca/whois.asp?domain=joepro.com&wserver=whois.internic.ca

This leads you to a the names of the people who own the PropertyGuys franchise – a simple Google search reveals that.

Hope that helps.

Indeed, the names do match up. Can you tell me where you found this information? It didn’t seem to be very apparent on the PrivateSaleBlog.ca web site.

Are you affiliated with the web site?

(PS – I would have replied via email, but the address you supplied bounced back as non-existent)

It is registered to this company:
http://www.internic.ca/whois.asp?domain=profitmartpro.com&wserver=whois.internic.ca