PolicyMap Maps A Metric Crapload of Data
This is pretty cool. PolicyMap is a new site by The Reinvestment Fund (TRF), a national not-for-profit organization that finances neighborhood revitalization.
It’s a Google Maps mashup on steroids.
They offer “4,000 indicators related to demographics, real estate markets, crime, schools, housing affordability, employment, energy, and public investments” all layered on to a map source.
The information gets layered on in color-coded “heat maps” – a trend we’ve seen on many other sites but not nearly to this level before.
There’s a ton of data here.
PolicyMap says they’re pulling all that data from a number of sources including the U.S. Census, Claritas, the FBI, the IRS as well as information from the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act and Boxwood Means (a real estate research firm), among others. It compiles all that data and then scrubs it to ensure that it is reliable and accurate.
I could see myself possibly using PolicyMap to investigate a move to a new neighborhood – or at least seeing how it stakes up against existing tools like Cyberhomes (new facelift btw – nice), Zillow or Trula. No listings though, so it is purely a research tool.
To a real estate investor or developer however, this is a goldmine of information.
To use PolicyMaps you can sign up a free account – and for advanced users they offer additional functionality and access to premium data sources for $200 a month.
More from BlownMortgage - PolicyMap – Killer tool for real estate
2 Comment(s)
8 Trackback(s)
- From Policy Map « Urban Neighbourhood | Jul 29, 2008
- From Internet Marketing for Real Estate » Google Maps + Data = PolicyMap | Jul 30, 2008
- From PolicyMap » PolicyMap Maps A Metric Crapload of Data | Nov 11, 2008
- From PolicyMap » policymap.com - all the demographic data you need ! | Nov 14, 2008
- From PolicyMap » policymap.com - all the demographic data you need ! | Nov 25, 2008
- From Policy Map | Urban Neighbourhood | Nov 2, 2009
- From PolicyMap » January Updates | Jan 27, 2010
- From Google Maps + Data = PolicyMap | Feb 1, 2010
Kyle Else | May 22, 2008 | Reply
I watched a presentation of Policy Map – Tuesday, April 29 during the LI 2008 Conference in Santa Clara. The presentation was called “Good data, smart decisions: transforming neighborhood analysis with PolicyMap” and one of the smartest offerings was the ability to generate a pre-defined summary report (ie: Community Profile, Housing Market Report, Rental Housing Report, IRS Tax Report) of any area within its coverage.
Pushpin team | May 22, 2008 | Reply
Ahh, we thought it was an imperial crapload
Regardless it's a lot of data.
The application is, strictly speaking, not a Google mashup but rather a Pushpin mashup. Same idea though.