Trulia released its API this morning, simultaneously sparking a whole new business model (the mashup of a mashup) and thus introducing in others a whole new level of self-doubt and period of intense philosophical reflection on what it means to be a mashup. (I mash therefore I am?)

I guess this is Real Estate 2.0^2.0.

Trulia’s API provides access primarily to two types of data; local pricing trends and search behavior. Potential developers can find more information on the Trulia API site.

The hope is that the release of their API will spur all kinds of new development. Someone could pair it with the Zillow API, throw in some craigslist feeds and a Flickr photo feed and create the ultimate neighborhood real estate portal, for example.

Not to be outdone on day one, Trulia’s developers held an internal competition and came up with two examples of what can be done with the API. Both are pretty cool.

Truliaholic

I had a lot of fun with this tool. You compare two US cities and produce instant visual comparison of average list price or search popularity. I didn’t really care about search popularity, but comparing list prices in different markets was fun.

Open Challenge to All Readers: Can you find the biggest difference between two markets in the US? (Post your findings in comments)

plotornot.com

Potentially the more statistically useful of the two – but not as visually impactful. Allows you to compare two different data sets from a state (e.g. median household income vs. average listing price) and see how the two relate on a scatter chart and median line.

My favorite search – ‘Does the Average rainfall relate to the Average listing price in Oregon?’ (Apparently not!)

I can’t see many agents taking advantage of Trulia’s API, however it may just be what tech-savvy brokers, who want to add more contextual information to their sites, have been looking for. Unfortunately, the data offerings (avg. price and search popularity) are somewhat limited right now, though I hope to see this expand in the future.

Update: More from Techcrunch.

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