The 6 Best Housing Apps of 2021

Mobile real estate apps are simplifying the home buying process. Here's are six of the best home search apps for iOS and Android.

What You Need to Know if You Want to Buy a Home at an Online Auction

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Most Versatile House Finding App: Homes.com for Sale, Rent

What We Like

Lists new properties before other apps.
Grades nearby schools based on their performance on state tests.

What We Don't Like

Some listings are out-of-date.
Doesn't cover some rural areas.

Homes.com's mobile app provides searchable listings for millions of homes for sale or rent. Search filters include price, size, year built, and building types, such as a house, condo, bungalow, or townhome.

Listings are accompanied by interactive maps and high-resolution photos, You can share the houses you like with real estate agents, family, and friends via email, text message, and more.

Download For:

iOS

Android

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Most Visual Real Estate App: Realtor.com Real Estate

What We Like

Sign Snap fearure lets you send photos of a home for sale and receive details back.
Get updates on viewed listings.

What We Don't Like

Recommendation filters aren't always on target.
Occasional bugs.

Realtor.com is a comprehensive and visually compelling app available on iOS and Android. The Android versions support Google Chromecast for streaming pictures from your device to a TV. On both platforms, listings are accompanied by Google Street Views, with some listings offering 3D tours.

The app is also attentive to your search preferences. If you scroll down the listings page after you've done a search, you can find suggested listings with similar features in the same neighborhood. Additionally, based on your search criteria, the app sends you alerts about new listings that spring up.

Download For:

iOS

Android

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Best for Getting a Feel for the Area: Trulia Real Estate App

What We Like

Trulia Neighborhoods feature provides virtual neighborhood tours.
Responsive tech support team.

What We Don't Like

Some listings come with sketches of buildings instead of photos, or with interior shots only.
Lags when scrolling through photos.

Like Realtor.com's app, the Trulia app is available on iOS and Android. Regardless of platform, Trulia allows you to search for amenities by using keywords like "waterfront."

A few additional standout capabilities include customizable email and push notification alerts, school reports by parents, crime statistics for the area, and an open house scheduling tool.

Download For:

iOS

Android

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Most Filter-Abundant Housing App: Zillow

What We Like

Zestimate home values can help decide if a neighborhood is on the rise or declining.
Includes data regarding purchase history of the property.
Can share with both users and non-users.

What We Don't Like

Listings updates lag a few days behind MLS listings.
No way to hide listings pending sale.

The Zillow app brings some unusual strengths. Aside from the more conventional features found in real estate apps, you can view Zillow's trademarked Zestimate home values for more than 100 million homes across the nation. Zillow also claims to offer many listings unavailable through the MLS, a set of listings from realtors which many apps rely on as a database.

Filters in Zillow are abundant for a mobile app, allowing you to search for manufactured homes and lots/land, for example, and by drive time and types of nearby schools. Satellite maps and video tours are available as well.

Download For:

iOS

Android

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Finest House Hunting App for Photos: Homesnap Real Estate and Rentals

What We Like

Users praise how well the listings are kept up-to-date.
Especially useful for agents.

What We Don't Like

Some listings can be misleading if you don't dig into the details.
Some features on the iOS version aren't available for Android.

Homesnap pioneered the feature of delivering details about properties based on user-submitted photos. These details are gathered from public records, as well as multiple real estate listing services.

The app is extensively photo-driven; you might see dozens of photos for a single listing. Furthermore, listings generally give you in-depth details about the history and features of the property.

Download For:

iOS

Android

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Best Maps in a Housing App: Real Estate by Xome

What We Like

Walk Score and Bike Score can help you to quickly determine how well the community will work for your household.
Lots of pictures.

What We Don't Like

Doesn't include a typical list view. To access specific listings, you must tap property icons on the map.
Limited soft filters.

Xome is an all-in-one app for finding real estate listings and contacting agents. You can either search by current location or specific address or draw a custom region on the map.

Map overlays make it simple to highlight neighborhoods, subdivisions, school districts, and nearby points of interest. A slick built-in mortgage calculator gives you total mortgage figures, along with piecharts showing breakouts for principal and interest payments, as well as taxes and insurance.

Download For:

iOS

Android

Web-Based Virtual Assistants as Alternatives

While it only takes a few minutes to download and install apps, another approach you can try is using a virtual personal assistant like Google Assistant, Apple Siri, or Microsoft Cortana.

Your experience with these voice-enabled, browser-based search engines probably won't be a match for what you'll get from a mobile app, but here are a few things to know before you choose to use them:

By speaking search terms like "houses near me by owners" into Google Assistant, Siri, or Cortana, you will receive some search results, yet most of the links will bring you to either real estate agencies or house-finding websites. Sometimes those websites load decently on mobile devices, but most sites are designed for PC screens, not phones or small tablets.
You won't receive the cool bells and whistles that you get from housing apps.

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