Virtualfsbo.com/

VirtualFSBO.com is a for sale by owner website built in 1999. Website has about 3,000 current and active listings (homes for sale by owner). Does best from January through July. August to December is the slow season for real estate.

Averaging $14,440 in revenue since January 2005.
Averaging $11,194 in net income since January 2005.

Major keyword rankings in Google:
1. Homes for sale by owner: fluctuates between #5 to #7
2. for sale by owner: #11 to #18
3. houses for sale: #8 to #12
4. FSBO: #4 to #10
5. Houses for sale by owner: #4 to #5
6. Flat Fee MLS: #4 - #5
7. Real Estate for Sale by Owner: #6 - #9

Major keywords in Yahoo:
1. Homes for sale by owner: #19
2. for sale by owner: #13
3. FSBO: #13
4. Houses for sale by owner: #2

Major keywords in MSN (Live.com):
1. Homes for sale by owner: #3
2. FSBO: #6
3. Houses for sale by owner: #1 and #2
4. Houses for sale: #3

It also ranks high in these search engines for a bunch of other smaller keywords like "log homes for sale", "mexico homes for sale", and many, many more.

I bought this website a few months ago from relatives. Traffic was a little bit more than 77,000 unique visitors during July, 2007 according to Google Analytics (see attached screen shot).

Expenses that new owner would incur include:
1. AdWords: about $15/day
2. PayPal API Virtual Terminal: $20/month
2. Your web hosting. Currently it is hosted on a dedicated server that I use for my other websites.
3. I recently bought some advertising links on a few real estate websites. Not sure if those help or not. I pay $182/month for them. No contract or anything, can cancel them at anytime.

The website as it currently functions requires me to spend about 1 hour a day answer emails, reviewing new listings, and deleting expired or sold listings. The website is fully automated. New listings create themselves using ASP coding. Maps that you see within the listings are also automatically put on the listing with the code. All photos uploaded are automatically inserted into the appropriate listing, resized, and everything. The homeowner can add, replace and delete photos within their account without any assistance. Once in a blue moon, you will get someone who cannot upload a photo from their account and will attach them in an email for you to do. Also, when someone submits an order to put their home in the local MLS, the system also handles all of the emailing to both homeowner and our affiliate (a really friendly company that is great at handling everything).

Other than that, the website runs itself. I'll be more than happy to meet with the new buyer of the website (over phone or in person) and show them how everything works. It really is awesome and very automated. One hour is really all you need per day for maintaining it as it is now. The credit card processing is done via an API through PayPal.com. It automatically accepts all major credit card types without ever leaving the website, deposits the money in your PayPal account and then automatically depsoits it in your bank account within a few days. Buyers do not need a PayPal account, only a major credit card. It would be really easy to set-up the API system in any PayPal business account so deposits go to your account. I'd even walk you through the steps. All you need is a PayPal business account.

Will obviously provide proof of all revenue and traffic to any serious buyer. I do require a "non-Disclosure Agreement" to be signed before providing financials.

 

Revenue Details:

I currently do not charge for homeowners to post listings. Money is made from Foreclsoure list sign-ups, AdSense, MLS flat-fee sign-ups, Real Estate sales contracts, and photo uploads. First photo is free, then each additional photo the homeowner uploads is $5 (just started charging for photos on August 29th). We'll see how that works out soon.

Traffic Details:

Traffic comes from home owners and home buyers. Traffic is well dispersed between Yahoo and Google. Google (35%), Yahoo (33%) and MSN (8%).