Trulia

Trulia meets and often sets the standards for what consumers should expect in a real estate app. Whether you're an investor looking to maximize your return or a prospective homeowner, Trulia brings a diverse set of tools to the table and makes some smart, smaller decisions that really maximize the convenience of using this app.

That focus on the user experience is a good thing, because there's a lot of information to parse once you start digging into information on a listing. A well-designed gallery lets the home's photos speak for themselves, but a general description of the home's features and rooms can be found here as well. The quality of a listing page will largely depend on the agent or homeowner representing themselves, but there's a decent amount of information that Trulia provides themselves.

That includes critical data like the pricing history for the home, a general tax assessment for the property, and a general understanding of price trends you can expect looking forward. But where Trulia really distinguishes themselves from the competition is in the quality metrics they have to offer for a home's neighborhood. This is an app that understands that a home is about more than just the number of bedrooms, but each home comes accompanied by important metrics on the community surrounding that home.

You'll find a heat map that helps analyze crime in the neighborhood as long as breakdowns of schools that service a specific neighborhood. Similar maps are provided for restaurants and nightlife, and you can even use the integrated Google Maps information to see a home up close and personal and walk around the surrounding neighborhood virtually.

This sort of information can be especially useful when you pull back to the bigger picture and start looking at your options in terms of neighborhoods. Trulia's map system is easy to navigate, and there are a ton of great filtering options you can use to narrow down your results. Data like school districts allow you to capably determine where the best homes for your family are. You can even sketch out an area with your finger to more precisely focus your search where you want it to be. Listings use a clean paneled structure that offers all the critical information that you need but still allows a number of listings to be presented per page.

Once you're interested in a particular home, Trulia makes it easy to connect a buyer with a prospective seller. Agent information is presented directly on the listing, but Trulia also offers automated options for getting in touch with an agent. Both virtual and real-life tours can be scheduled using a simple built-in calendar, and there are even options to hunt down financing options directly through the Trulia user interface.

Pros:

• Exhaustive and well-presented neighborhood and home data
• Extensive tools for determining your financing options
• Notifications can be highly customized

Cons:

• Neighborhood crime map can be a little confusing
• Quality of listings depends on the person placing the listing