The Senate just approved an extension to the Homebuyer Tax Credit that would give qualifying buyers currently under contract until September 30, 2010 to complete their sale.  The previous deadline was June 30.  Because of the large number of buyers waiting for lender approval, the Realtors group pushed hard for the extension. It's estimated that this will affect about 180,000 buyers. See the entire story at the link below.  http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gyeaY6RTkGpP0yC5IUaTXUXLpe6AD9GCIFFO0

As you may have noticed, a few things have changed here.  Really a lot of things have changed.  We have completely revamped our website and built it from the ground up.  The new site has been in development for close to 6 months now and we are excited to roll it out.  We are transitioning our website address from coldwellbanker-idaho.com to cbidaho.com. Along with an easier domain name we are also beginning to use an easier phone number to remember.  You can now reach our office at 208-765-2222.  Both our old domain (coldwellbanker-idaho.com) and old phone number (208-664-1461) will continue to work and we have no plans to discontinue them.  Here is a list of a few of the major new features of our new website.

Design - The design was inspired by the new coldwellbanker.com which is still in beta and will launch in June.  We wanted to keep things simple and fast to make the real estate search process as easy as possible.  Not to be too geeky, but we are using the latest web technologies and implemented AJAX to enable you to quickly browse through search results.

Mobile - More and more our customers want to find information on real estate while they are looking at properties.  We put a major emphasis in providing tools to allow users to search every property listed in the area, browse open house listings and find contact information for our sales associates.  You can view our mobile site by visiting cbidaho.com on any smartphone or mobile browser.

We also included links on our mobile page to the national Coldwell Banker applications built specifically for the iPhone, Blackberry and Android devices.  These mobile offerings lead the market with the most accessible and powerful mobile search available today.

Social Networks – While we have been using Twitter, Facebook and YouTube for some time now, we thought it was difficult to find and connect with us.  We have changed our username to cbidaho across all the primary social networks and created a social networks page where you can view our latest activity.  Our homepage now prominently displays our latest Twitter posts and we encourage you to follow us at twitter.com/cbidaho for the latest updates on real estate in North Idaho.  Along with the new names and pages, we are introducing our new company blog.  Our blog will feature upcoming Coldwell Banker events, local real estate news, market trends and company updates.

Property Watch - Our new real estate search engine now gives you the ability to track local listings at Property Watch.  Here is a quick description of the service.

Property Watch helps you streamline the property search process by allowing you to setup watches with specific criteria and then doing the work for you 24 hours a day. You may also save search criterias and properties for future viewing, making finding that perfect property easier than ever before.

Save Searches
After creating your profile, you can save as many of your search criteria you'd like. This helps you save time and takes you straight to the search results you want to see.

Save Properties
Once you find a propety that you like, you can save that property to Property Watch for future viewing.

Instant Notification
Receive emails showing properties that match your saved search criteria.

These are just a few of the updates we have made.  Please browse through our site to see all the new content and features.  You can find a link below the navigation bar on each page where we invite you to give us your feedback on the new site, design and features.