Collegetown Connect

Apartment searching website for collegetowns. Feedback-designed apartment searching software, all based on student and landlord inputs and tests. Like redfin except for rentals and for collegetown areas. The software is designed with a heavy focus on student, landlord, and university usability and integration. Developed based on feedback and surveys on 480+ individuals, mostly students of all demographics. 

 

The survey is here: http://bit.ly/CCsurvey 

 

Currently we are developing our software and plan to finish it January 31st, 2010. We'll be testing it at my school (Cornell U) for the coming spring '10 and fall '10 semesters while we continue to grow and bring people on board.

 

Kamil Bojanczyk: CEO. Researching in smart grid HAN solutions, communication protocols (802.15.4b mainly). Software developer at Wireless Glue and Keithley Instruments.  BS EE and Bioengineering, Cornell '10

 

Joseph Wu: CMO. Started and ran a Katrina schoolbook and scholarship distribution drive and is working on a Cornell-specific information/activity aggregator site. PAM, Cornell '11 

 

Friend A: Java Developer, Back end.  Masters EE, Gainsville '08 

Friend  B: Java Developer, Front end. BS InfoScience, Cornell '09

 

One or two others to be included in Jan '10.  

Generate revenue from landlords paying to list. An optimized pricing structure is TBD, but generally it will be something like having 30 days to list for $30. Multiply this by an average of 3000 listings per university per year for an idea of the revenues generated.

The main one is that we're students ourselves.  

 

We are collaborating with the landlord, student, and university to achieve the optimized user interface for each party. Also, we gain credibility and easier user acceptance through an affiliation with the university. An overwhelming 85% of students and landlords prefer a university-specific apartment searching site.