It’s been eight years since its initial review and this one-time 3D tour creator has matured into a powerfully comprehensive whole-home capture solution, great for inspections, appraisals, renovation pricing and, yes, still, 3D tours.
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This article was last updated June 13, 2024.
InsideMaps is a visual marketing and property information solution
Platforms: Web; fully mobile responsive
Ideal for: Listing agents, property managers, inspectors and underwriters
Initial review: Jan 2016
Update: June 2024
Top selling points:
• Exceptional versatility
• Comprehensive data collection
• Detailed room-by-room descriptions
• Integrated appliance data
• Renovation visualizations
Top concern(s)
InsideMaps does a lot, maximizing every bit of interior data for its users, which could prevent some from switching if looking only for a tour capture partner.
What you should know
InsideMaps is helping me prove a theory I’ve held for a few years — the idea that the standard American home is becoming as much a digital asset as it is a physical one. It’ll soon require security best practices, rules at closing for who owns what information and become another powerful case for blockchain.
Artificial intelligence is furthering this notion, especially when empowered by solutions like InsideMaps, which is able to wrangle all the invisible ones and zeros that float throughout a house into any number of marketing and business insights.
The company’s software is delivered via iPhone and its automated rotating base unit. You can use it to nail a single image for virtual renovation, measurements or for use in an appraisal. Or, like competing tools, tour the home to create a walkable tour, complete with a navigable floor plan and dollhouse view.
Property report maps can be viewed via each floor, then each room, and it’s all accompanied by an array of static but critical data, such as room and total home dimensions, content summaries, gross livable area data, appliance data (with energy ratings, lifespan and size) and just about any other useful tranche of information about each component of a home.
That alone is worth the price of admission, but what InsideMaps has done is create new ways to use all of that information beyond making a website page look better. For example, it can combine its room visualizations with renovation cost forecasts, with ROI on investment, and provide downloadable inspection observations.
The latter feature isn’t meant to replace an actual in-person inspection (I maintain it can), but it sure can speed things up, better inform out-of-market buyers and assist appraisers. It’s ideal for investors and would give anxious first-time buyers a good deal of additional confidence in what they’re buying.
InsideMaps property reports also add value to the owner who likes to know as much as possible about the ongoing cost of ownership, a growing challenge in today’s inflation-burdened economy. The software can process thermal imagery (with the right base attachment) to detect home-wide energy inefficiencies, offer appliance lifespan updates and detail all kinds of potential home projects with project scope per room, average material pricing and even contractor rates.
It’s also a great tool for landlords, who could ask tenants leaving to snap a few pictures to analyze move-out condition or if a price is needed for some repairs. Its visual rendering capabilities can quickly get a unit on the web for marketing while the actual turn takes place in real time. Property managers can use it to assess a new client, asking for permission to walk the property for a quick digital overview on what to expect.
The company has been working for years with appraisal companies and single-family REITs — real estate investment trusts. I find this to be an ideal use of its flexible platform because, like it or not, SFR REITS are commercial entities. It’s about the bottom line for investors. When it comes to managing expenses across a real estate portfolio of stick-built homes, the more they know and the quicker they know it, the better.
If you only want a quick, interactive tour of a cool new listing, InsideMaps is a great option. They’re proven, having been around well more than a decade, and you can do a lot more for your seller with what its tools capture.
But, if you want to get to know a home at what the company calls, “the DNA level,” I’m not sure you can do much better.
Craig C. Rowe started in commercial real estate at the dawn of the dot-com boom, helping an array of commercial real estate companies fortify their online presence and analyze internal software decisions. He now helps agents with technology decisions and marketing through reviewing software and tech for Inman.
Have a technology product you would like to discuss? Email Craig Rowe.
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