Rentometer
is a Google Maps mashup that could come in handy if you're apartment-hunting. Give it a U.S. address and a few particulars about a
place for rent at that address (monthly rent, number of bedrooms,
number of units in the rental property) and it displays a “rentometer”
showing where it falls in the range of rents in the neighborhood and a
Google Map with markers showing how the rents at nearby rental
properties compare:
Rentometer represents not only a useful service, but also some good UI choices:
- Great visualization: Rentometer's display gives you a very clear picture of the range of neighbourhood rents at a glance, with the “dial” showing you where the given address falls in that range and the Google Map showing you where the cheaper, equivalent and more expensive places are. The old way to present this data would've been with a table; this shows that mashups can be used to deliver information in a more meaningful way.
- Use of appropriate technologies: The Rentometer developers did a good job of playing tools to their strengths: the “rentometer” dial is rendered using Flash while the Google Map is DHTML and JavaScript.