New Commercial Real Estate Web Site Focuses on Consumers

PropertyGo.com on Monday joined the growing ranks of Internet sites offering commercial real estate services, with the Studio City-based upstart focusing on consumers instead of brokers as its primary audience.

The listings on the newly launched site can be viewed for free--unlike those of some other commercial real estate listing services--and consumers can post a free “want ad” for property ranging from industrial space to apartments. The site--https://www.propertygo.com--charges property owners and brokers to carrying their listings.

Mark Chase, a former real estate broker and co-founder of PropertyGo.com, said the site “takes information that traditionally was closely held by brokers and directly places it in the hands of consumers, business owners, property owners, lessors and lessees.”

The new site, which starts with about 2,500 property listings in Los Angeles County, faces many established and larger competitors, including Burlingame, Calif.-based LoopNet and Propertyfirst.com of Los Angeles. In addition to other Internet rivals, PropertyGo.com must also compete against established information services such as CoStar Group Inc., a Washington-based firm that sells access to its nationwide inventory of real estate listings.

Interest in Internet services is growing in the commercial real estate community, but the Web at present plays a far greater role in residential real estate. A recent survey by the California Assn. of Realtors showed that nearly 40% of home buyers used the Internet to buy a home.

In contrast, commercial real estate professionals are now just growing accustomed to using e-mail, Chase said. “The brokerage community still doesn’t know how the Internet works.”