A new website has been launched to arm potential Richmond homebuyers with incredibly detailed visual information on the neighbourhood of their choice.
The site - estateblock. com - was launched in the summer, visually mapping all kinds of publicly-accessible statistics, such as education and income levels, crime rates, schools, daycares and transit options. But what might open up many people's eyes is the fine detail the site goes into under the "demographics" category, which delves down as deep as: citizenship and status; immigrants by country; language spoken and visible minority groups.
Each sub category breaks down the options to highlight the percentages of the chosen subject in a plethora of Richmond communities and highlights it by "heat" colours linked to percentages.
Estateblock founder Vadim Marusin believes the visual mapping tool sets them apart from the likes of realtor.ca.
"There is a national site, but it doesn't come close to providing the kind of localized information we do," said Marusin.
"It's about giving more information and power to the buyer; this is the reason we did this."
There are no drawbacks to using the likes of crime rates and cultural demographics,
insists Marusin, despite concerns that such information can be sporadic and hinder multi-cultural integration.
"I don't believe (it's negative), the stats are all provided by the RCMP or Stats Canada," said Marusin.
"It is what it is, and people can make up their own minds. I'll be honest, we were not sure at first about creating the immigration category under the demographics.
"But once we talked to people at the government, nobody seemed to have any concerns. It's not telling people whether it's good or bad to live there, it's totally their choice.
"I'm Russian and I think it's fun to see where all the Russians live in Richmond. People are free to live anywhere, and if they want to live near people with the same cultural background, that's their choice."
Joe Greenholtz, a certified immigration consultant who sits on city council's intercultural advisory committee, feels people are unlikely to use the new site negatively.
"In a practical sense, I don't think anyone could use this tool to select by ethnicity or country of origin, except at a fairly crude level," said Greenholtz.
"The bigger question, of course, is the impulse to provide this sort of information. I say provide rather than request because providing this type of information creates an awareness or a need for it that wouldn't have existed otherwise. I think people will look at the various demographics the way I did, out of curiosity. I don't see anyone using it in any critical way."
Marusin does admit estateblock - which placed in the top 15 of 144 companies in the BC Innovation Council's New Ventures BC 2013 competition - is essentially a real estate service, albeit a free service and has realtors on board. "It's a dream business plan really," he added.
Although it's only been in operation for a few months, estateblock has been two years in the making, gathering all manner of background information on neighbourhoods, categorizing and shaping it into the tool it is today.
"We try to keep the information as up to date as possible; as soon as it becomes publicly available, we try to get it up there," said Marusin.
"Communities are changing very fast in the Lower Mainland, but Richmond seems to be
pretty steady. I've not noticed too many changes there in terms of the kind of details we're providing.
"However, owners in a good catchment area can attract more buyers with this. Think how long it sometimes takes when you ask your realtor to find you a home in a certain area of Richmond, at a certain price range, with a certain square footage.
"The realtor's idea may be different from yours, so having all this information on our site can quickly narrow down your search and slash the time spent searching. I think the concept is so simple and the more information people have, the better," he said.
