Movoto is proud to introduce Home Roam. Home Roam allows you, the user, to move the map around freely and have all available properties within the visible part of the map appear as you move around, or Roam.
Home Roam is unique to Movoto. It combines two distinct search functions into one very enjoyable experience. Home Roam begins as a normal search. In this case I am searching for properties in Wine Country, Sonoma, CA. I am a big fan of wine, but I am not too familiar with the various wine towns surrounding Sonoma. Lucky for me, Home Roam exists. Take a look:
You can see the essence of Home Roam along the edges of the map. These dots represent properties that meet my search criteria, but are not in the city I searched for. They are there to let you know that properties for sale are available in the area around your search. You can simply choose to ignore them and browse through properties in Sonoma, or you can drag the mouse over and take a look at them.
Because the dots represent properties outside of your intended search, we treat them differently. In the example here, I put my mouse pointer on top of a pin. Instead of the normal pop up, we show a much smaller pop up with limited information. We also attach a pin to the dot so that you can be extra certain you are on the right dot. These pins come with a nifty shadow that we thought gave it a little extra pizazz.
The dots act exactly like their pin cousins. Clicking on a dot (or the associated pin) will take you to the property page where you can see all the details of the property. Additionally, changing the criteria on left will limit which dots are shown.
And finally, the moment you have all been waiting for: Home Roam.
Home Roam initiates when all the pins from the original search are no longer visible on the screen. Several things happen at the moment Home Roam initiates:
- What were once dots are now pins. As you continue to move about the map in any way you please, pins will continue to pop up displaying properties for sale.
- Your original search text in the search bar turns to “Home Roam”. (That way you know when you are roaming about.)
- Your original search is removed from My Search Area on the left.
- The count of listings under the search bar will reflect the number of pins visible on the map.
Home Roam is one of the most used features on MapSearch with over 1/4 of you guys using the new feature! And it gets even better. We are coming out with some major changes to MapSearch over the next couple of weeks, so get ready for an even better search experience.
