I thought I’d post this graphic to give you a behind-the-scenes idea of how our overall area is segmented for us Realtors to hone in on what a Buyer says they want. The powers that be have divided locations and therefore created an order of sorts to searching for properties. This translates to public searches as well as Realtor ones, and/but is interesting from our perspective because it is the quickest way for us to pull up data on statistics etc., and it also governs how people navigate online. For instance, as you can see, Lake Oswego is combined with West Linn for RMLS purposes into area 147. We can pull some Lake-Oswego-specific data, but have to use a few tricks & maneuvers to do so. Also, if a home is on the dividing line between two areas, a Realtor may find themselves weighing pro’s & cons of advertising in one area or the other when listing a home. Most of the time it’s a no-brainer what area a property fits into, but sometimes it can mean a person searching for a home in one area may not see a home if it is assigned to the area next-door. This came up recently with a rural property on the dividing line between areas 148 (which bumps up against Lake Oswego and stretches all the way to near-Sauvie Island) and 149 that may have been seen by people searching closer in to Portland but maybe not by people looking for acreage who would prefer to be farther from Portland.
