Estimating Via Google Earth and Google Maps!

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IndyExterior

New member
I'm sure most here are aware of Google Earth and it's ability to zoom in from above to check out a roof. But in select cities and I'm sure most major markets soon Google Street View is available. We in Indy were one of the first. It must have been a logistical nightmare but Google had people drive almost every street in a city and surrounding area of well over 1 million people here. If you search on Google under maps and the "street view" is available you can view as if you are driving down the street. Pan, zoom, and turn etc. I can see a roof footprint from Google Earth and then a street view from Google maps Street view. If you don't have it try Indy or Chicago.

So far I've not given an actual price on a house by this since I'm the eternal skeptic. But so far it's been accurate. I've of course been concerned the 2,300 s/f walk up ranch I found on Google turns out to be a 6,500 s/f 12/12 pitch monster. But really an incredible tool.
 
We use google street view extensively. Most of the time Nathan cannot go out on a bid with me so I can pull up street view and virtually walk him around the buldings and explain stuff to him..

I absolutely love it.
 
Another thing to look for in your county is "xxx county real estate search"

or "xxx county tax records"

I can search the county tax records and each home has a profile that shows a picture, the purchase price, how old the home is, contact info for the owners and a sketch of the house. I use the sketch to get an idea of the size of the deck before going to estimate a house.

Heres an example: http://ustaxdata.com/nc/chatham/

You can search by name or by address
 
We use maps.live and a paid sub to google earth. Google is good for the polygon tool. It also measures sq ft in a circle as well. For a current and better 3D view we look to maps.live.com after google.
 
If you use Maps Live or Google Earth, AND the local property appraisers office Data, you can get a pretty good idea for an estimate.
Every now and then, the property is occluded by trees, etc.
I tell the customer that the quoted price is assuming the roof is walkable.
Often, it may LOOK walkable, but granule loss makes the roof unsafe :eek:
We charge a little more if we have to shoot a roof from the ground.
 
reef said:
Nah, I'm going to just tell people that their roof is $99.
Click to expand...
Hey, be Nice ?
My buddy is running a 99 dollar roof cleaning ad, LOL
 
I use Google maps often but there are some places that they will not let you view aerial or street view. I've also noticed that some satellite images are a few years old. I use Terraserver.com a lot. Most every imagery is current and you can view pretty much anywhere, it does cost monthly though. I like to print out a aerial photo of complex or community with google maps which are most of the time a couple years old, then a photo using terraserver to show how dirty their roofs have gotten over those few years. Makes selling the job easier if you can see their stains from space.
 
Prestige_Pressure said:
I use Google maps often but there are some places that they will not let you view aerial or street view. I've also noticed that some satellite images are a few years old. I use Terraserver.com a lot. Most every imagery is current and you can view pretty much anywhere, it does cost monthly though. I like to print out a aerial photo of complex or community with google maps which are most of the time a couple years old, then a photo using terraserver to show how dirty their roofs have gotten over those few years. Makes selling the job easier if you can see their stains from space.
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Shawn - this subscription service via aTerraserver, does it offer any features that aren't available on Bing Map's Birds Eye View? Thanks!
 
American-ProTech said:
Shawn - this subscription service via aTerraserver, does it offer any features that aren't available on Bing Map's Birds Eye View? Thanks!
Click to expand...

it does have a birds eye view from about what looks like about 100ft. nice and detailed and can 360 view. Haven't really used bing maps so not to sure but there are a lot of features with terraserver. It's 19.99 a month, I cancelled my subscription for dec. and jan. now back up and goin. You can try a demo of it on there website.
 
Prestige_Pressure said:
it does have a birds eye view from about what looks like about 100ft. nice and detailed and can 360 view. Haven't really used bing maps so not to sure but there are a lot of features with terraserver. It's 19.99 a month, I cancelled my subscription for dec. and jan. now back up and goin. You can try a demo of it on there website.
Click to expand...

Thanks. I'll give the demo a try to see how it compares.
 
IndyExterior said:
So far I've not given an actual price on a house by this since I'm the eternal skeptic. But so far it's been accurate. I've of course been concerned the 2,300 s/f walk up ranch I found on Google turns out to be a 6,500 s/f 12/12 pitch monster. But really an incredible tool.
Click to expand...


If I had to visit every RFQ, I'd be estimating 40+ hours a week and need a separate estimating vehicle plus it's gas, maint and ins costs.

We are in our 3rd season using aerial view estimating. It's worked out great for us. We do about 90% house washes and roof cleanings from Bing and maybe 25% of our deck jobs. The most important aspect of estimating this way is to ask questions while viewing the house and to remind the HO that the price is just an estimate. Qualify every statement or price with words like "based on typical, normal, usual". Every day I blow people calling for an appointment away when I pull off the road, get their address and while they are describing their home I've pulled it up on the mobile. When they ask "when" I tell them I'll be giving them an estimate before we hang up. about 5 min after the call they get a pdf of the estimate (if they give me an email address) via our cloud based service software.

Free estimates are really not free....the cost is in your overhead. My best guess is that we increased profit per job by 10-20 percent. The occasional underbid is covered by the occasional overbid and/or the savings. Our avg hourly rate is still above our target rate so far this year, we have job check in/checkout so this is easy to track.

I love the technology, we are going to add some more. We mms a start and end (before and after) image to the HO's mobile. I'd like to add live stream demo capability and we are already working on a twitter "live" coupon.
 
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