Seattle Entrepreneurs Create Web Platform For Potential Homebuyers And Sellers; Game Changer In Identifying The Perfect Real Estate Agent

SEATTLE, June 19, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Purchasing a home is among the biggest decision a person will make in his or her life. Selling a home is no small task in its own right. Hiring the right professional to guide a potential homebuyer or seller through these complicated processes is essential. Before today, a reliable tool used to locate and read feedback from previous home buyers and sellers didn't exist. Now there is Zubii.

Zubii is a user-friendly, online resource designed to make it easy for homebuyers or sellers to find and connect with a real estate agent they can rely on and trust, and who is an expert on their neighborhood of choice. Users can choose an agent befitting their needs based on positive reviews and recommendations from real clients the agent has represented in the past. Real clients share their experiences and this determines an agent's ranking. The more reliable, knowledgeable and trustworthy, the better the ranking and the better the chance the agent will be hired by future potential homebuyers or sellers.

The creators of Zubii – Keith Akada, Jason Ramos and Steven Fujita – are all mortgage planners with a combined 29 years of real estate industry experience. Akada is a former real estate coach with Tom Ferry, a New York Times best-selling author and respected real estate industry speaker. Ramos and Fujita have made names for themselves throughout the greater Seattle area as knowledgeable, trustworthy and savvy mortgage planners.

The three men identified a need in the marketplace after years of interacting with homebuyers and sellers who were frustrated and defeated after working with real estate agents that weren't knowledgeable, professional, or working diligently on their behalf.  The only online platforms that existed were "pay to play," meaning the sites were supported by advertising dollars spent by the agents that allowed them to be featured over and above their competition. Akada, Ramos, and Fujita created Zubii as a place for reviews that reflect an agent's performance, not the size of his or her advertising budget.

"Our hope is that real estate agents and potential home buyers and sellers will find Zubii to be the most trusted, comprehensive resource to date," says Chief Visionary Officer Keith Akada. "Zubii has the capabilities to really change the way real estate agents do business and the way buyers and sellers find their ideal agent."

Leveling the playing field for agents

For agents, Zubii levels the playing field by taking advertising budget out of the equation and providing up-to-date, honest, and unfiltered information potential clients can trust.

Zubii allows real estate agents to register on the site and build their agent profile, creating a place for consumers to read what cities and neighborhoods each agent knows best. Other features of the site include real-time Instagram photos of current listings and open houses and tweets from agents about current properties on the market. Also, there will be a place for agents to recommend local vendors like contractors, plumbers, and interior designers to ease new homeowners into their neighborhood.

Trustworthy, third-party reviews for potential homebuyers

Consumers benefit from Zubii because they can easily locate agents with expertise in specific neighborhoods. This information can be trusted because it comes from real people – neighbors – who have done business with those agents.

Zubii has created a place where all information is vetted, verified, and based on consumer reviews. Your future neighbors are telling you who you should trust because they have worked with these agents. The only people that can write testimonials about their experience with the agent are the agent's former clients. This eliminates the issue of fraudulent reviews.

"The process of finding a real estate agent was full of unknowns before Zubii – there was no way to vet the perfect agent for your specific needs or be sure that an agent genuinely specialized in the neighborhood or city in which the client was looking to buy or sell. Other real estate sites function on the pay-to-play model. The more the agent spends, the more prominent their presence online. There is no method of evaluation in place to prove if they truly specialize in the neighborhoods they say they know well."

Zubii will launch in beta on June 20, 2013 at an unveiling for Seattle real estate agents. The beta version of the site can be viewed at www.zubii.com. In order for agents to customize their profile on Zubii, they are charged an annual fee. In order for buyers and sellers to access agent information, they must register their information with Zubii and the site can be viewed free of charge.

About Zubii
Zubii, a Seattle-based real estate technology company, was founded in 2013 by Keith Akada, Jason Ramos and Steven Fujita. It is a tool designed to ease homebuyers through the process of locating the ideal real estate agent to suit their needs based on the positive reviews and recommendations of real clients. It will be available in beta on June 20, 2013.

SOURCE Zubii