Home Rental Blog » General http://www.rentvine.com/blog The pulse of the small unit rental market. Dave Dugdale reports what he sees in the online rental market place. Dave also provides a podcast show called RadioVine which is on a separate feed from this one. Visit www.rentvine.com/anc/radiovine.cfm for the shows and feed. Mon, 28 Mar 2011 22:22:31 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 A Site To Find Rental To Avoid http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/a-site-to-find-rental-to-avoid/ http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/a-site-to-find-rental-to-avoid/#comments Mon, 28 Mar 2011 22:22:31 +0000 Dave Dugdale http://www.rentvine.com/blog/?p=963 Post from: Dave Dugdale RentVine.com A Picture of Dave Dugdale

A Site To Find Rental To Avoid

]]> Most of us want a web site to find the perfect rental, but what if there was a site that helped you do the opposite? I must admit I giggled a little bit when I first learned of a site called donotrent.com.  So I guess after you find a rental you want to check out in person you might use this site to make sure others have been happy with it. It kind of reminds me of apartmentRatings.com.

I got to speak with Mike Cerny from donotrent via phone and recorded the call so I could transcribe the interview, but unfortunately I deleted that interview – sorry Mike.

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A Site To Find Rental To Avoid

]]> http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/a-site-to-find-rental-to-avoid/feed/ 0 Good News Google Is Backing out of the Real Estate Biz http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/good-news-google-is-backing-out-of-the-real-estate-biz/ http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/good-news-google-is-backing-out-of-the-real-estate-biz/#comments Wed, 26 Jan 2011 22:18:39 +0000 Dave Dugdale http://www.rentvine.com/blog/?p=937 Post from: Dave Dugdale RentVine.com A Picture of Dave Dugdale

Good News Google Is Backing out of the Real Estate Biz

]]> From a Google blog post:

In part due to low usage, the proliferation of excellent property-search tools on real estate websites, and the infrastructure challenge posed by the impending retirement of the Google Base API (used by listing providers to submit listings), we’ve decided to discontinue the real estate feature within Google Maps on February 10, 2011.

Happy dance.

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Good News Google Is Backing out of the Real Estate Biz

]]> http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/good-news-google-is-backing-out-of-the-real-estate-biz/feed/ 1 ManageMyProperty.com Has Cool Interactive Keyword Chart http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/managemyproperty-com-has-cool-interactive-keyword-chart/ http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/managemyproperty-com-has-cool-interactive-keyword-chart/#comments Tue, 27 Jul 2010 20:11:22 +0000 Dave Dugdale http://www.rentvine.com/blog/?p=923 Post from: Dave Dugdale RentVine.com A Picture of Dave Dugdale

ManageMyProperty.com Has Cool Interactive Keyword Chart

]]> I ran across a neat looking chart today on ManageMyProperty.com blog by Christopher Berkopas.

It kind of hurts a little that I my site was not included, but it is still a pretty cool chart.

What you do is click on the sites you are interested in and it will graphically show you how they rank for competitive keywords compared to other sites.

Give the rental keyword chart a try.

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ManageMyProperty.com Has Cool Interactive Keyword Chart

]]> http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/managemyproperty-com-has-cool-interactive-keyword-chart/feed/ 4 Freeze Warning Leave Heat On in Your Apartment http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/freeze-warning/ http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/freeze-warning/#comments Fri, 11 Dec 2009 16:55:49 +0000 Dave Dugdale http://www.rentvine.com/blog/?p=840 Post from: Dave Dugdale RentVine.com A Picture of Dave Dugdale

Freeze Warning Leave Heat On in Your Apartment

]]> fozen-pipes

I live near The Summit (Flat Irons) apartments and I noticed this sign above about leaving your heat on and letting the faucets dip.

We’ve had some really cold days the past week in Colorado and I am guessing this apartment complex has had some issue of pipes breaking and water damage to units below in the past.

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Freeze Warning Leave Heat On in Your Apartment

]]> http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/freeze-warning/feed/ 3 Property Management Template – Over 700 Downloads http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/property-management-template-over-700-downloads/ http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/property-management-template-over-700-downloads/#comments Wed, 02 Dec 2009 13:36:37 +0000 Dave Dugdale http://www.rentvine.com/blog/?p=828 Post from: Dave Dugdale RentVine.com A Picture of Dave Dugdale

Property Management Template – Over 700 Downloads

]]> My free property management template has been downloaded over 700 times since I released it in July of this year. Cool!

If you have not tried it please give it a try. There is nothing else like it on the web that will give you an incredibly dynamic listing web site for free.

property-real-estate-template

template rental

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Property Management Template – Over 700 Downloads

]]> http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/property-management-template-over-700-downloads/feed/ 0 RentVine is 4 Years Old Today http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/rentvine-is-4-years-old-today/ http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/rentvine-is-4-years-old-today/#comments Tue, 21 Apr 2009 13:53:52 +0000 Dave Dugdale http://www.rentvine.com/blog/?p=678 Post from: Dave Dugdale RentVine.com A Picture of Dave Dugdale

RentVine is 4 Years Old Today

]]> candles

RentVine turned 4 today! I have had a ton of fun working for myself. I can remember this well because my youngest was born around the same time.

My oldest was born around the time I started FlashAppointments (6 years ago), but I sold that company to my partner about 3 years ago.

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RentVine is 4 Years Old Today

]]> http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/rentvine-is-4-years-old-today/feed/ 4 Dugdale Number One On WeFollow For Rentals http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/dugdale-number-one-on-wefollow-for-rentals/ http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/dugdale-number-one-on-wefollow-for-rentals/#comments Mon, 23 Mar 2009 12:54:35 +0000 Dave Dugdale http://www.rentvine.com/blog/?p=668 Post from: Dave Dugdale RentVine.com A Picture of Dave Dugdale

Dugdale Number One On WeFollow For Rentals

]]> wefollow

OK, yes I am #1 on the new wefollow site under the “rentals” tag, but there are only two of us!  Once Dan D. adds himself I will drop down on the list. :)

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Dugdale Number One On WeFollow For Rentals

]]> http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/dugdale-number-one-on-wefollow-for-rentals/feed/ 0 Spotlight On AllStudentRentals.com http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/shot-light-on-allstudentrentalscom/ http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/shot-light-on-allstudentrentalscom/#comments Thu, 29 Jan 2009 22:31:48 +0000 Dave Dugdale http://www.rentvine.com/blog/?p=632 Post from: Dave Dugdale RentVine.com A Picture of Dave Dugdale

Spotlight On AllStudentRentals.com

]]> I know I have been writing about other rental web sites on my http://rentvine.wordpress.com/blog, but I thought I would write about AllStudentRentals.com here.

  • It appears like the site started about 8 months ago and is run by two guys out of CA.
  • It appears the site makes their money from a pay-per lead pricing model.
  • Right now it appears their coverage is pretty limited to CA.
  • They use a lot of Flash. Flash is near to my heart since I founded FlashAppointements.com many years ago and then handed it over to the partner I had. However you need to careful when using it too much.
  • Judging by their traffic on Compete.com they are off to a little bit of a dumpy ride which is to be expected with a new site. I am going to have that myself with my new PickRent.com site that I am still working on.
  • I have only looked over the site for about 10 minutes, but I can tell you the Flash they have is cool but they really need to be careful with it because of the page load times. They also need to work on their title tags.

allstudentrentals

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Spotlight On AllStudentRentals.com

]]> http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/shot-light-on-allstudentrentalscom/feed/ 4 Cazoodle Apartment Search http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/cazoodle-apartment-search/ http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/cazoodle-apartment-search/#comments Tue, 04 Nov 2008 14:45:41 +0000 Dave Dugdale http://www.rentvine.com/blog/?p=606 Post from: Dave Dugdale RentVine.com A Picture of Dave Dugdale

Cazoodle Apartment Search

]]> I ran across an interesting apartment site (and blog) the other day. I emailed back and forth with Arpit Jain and he explains the site with the following:

To help the users searching for rental apartments in a location, we are developing an apartment search engine that can automatically crawl thousands of apartment listings from all over the Web. Just like what Trulia does for real-estate or Google does for web pages, we are doing it for apartment rentals. You can visit the site at: apartments.cazoodle.com.

Seems like this model is taking off.

I think they need to fix the US map on the home page however, I wanted to use it as navagation not voting.

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Cazoodle Apartment Search

]]> http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/cazoodle-apartment-search/feed/ 2 RentBlurb.com Is Selling After 4 Years In Business http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/rentblurbcom-is-selling-after-4-years-in-business/ http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/rentblurbcom-is-selling-after-4-years-in-business/#comments Wed, 20 Aug 2008 14:06:05 +0000 Dave Dugdale http://www.rentvine.com/blog/?p=597 Post from: Dave Dugdale RentVine.com A Picture of Dave Dugdale

RentBlurb.com Is Selling After 4 Years In Business

]]> I just got off the phone with Aaron Hassen of RentBlurb.com. He is looking for a buyer of his regional rental site for the Orlando area which ranks pretty well on Google.

His site is done in PHP.

If you know anyone that is interested, have them contact Aaron on his contact form.

It is a little sad to see a regional site looking to sell.

Update: I just got this from Aaron:

As you are aware, your blog is highly influential and monitored by major players in our industry. With your help we have now received a number of bids to purchase our site. I’m writing today to inform you and your audience that this Friday, August 29th will be the last day we will be accepting bids for the purchase of RentBlurb.com. After Friday we will begin the process of selecting a buyer.

Post from: Dave Dugdale RentVine.com A Picture of Dave Dugdale

RentBlurb.com Is Selling After 4 Years In Business

]]> http://www.rentvine.com/blog/index.php/rentblurbcom-is-selling-after-4-years-in-business/feed/ 8