Apartment listing-to-Excel collector
Opening each listing and copying the details by hand is replaced by a single run: choose the complexes you follow, press start, and listing details are collected automatically into two Excel files. It runs from one executable, with no Python installation.
Checking listings by complex
Before
Opening each listing one by one
After
Choose complexes, run once · results in Excel
To protect client information, these screens recreate the same features with mock data.
Background
Some brokers follow a fixed set of complexes. With six of them chosen, they need to keep track of how many listings are up, on what terms, and what has changed since yesterday.
What we found
Checking one listing means clicking it in the list, opening the details and copying the fields by hand. With six complexes, that is not six rounds but one round per listing. The next day, it starts over.
The problem
Collecting was not the hard part. Collecting all of it was. Requests sent in quick succession get cut off partway, and if a run cannot pick up where it stopped, that day’s data is only half complete.
What we built
- Choose complexes and volume — Select any of the registered complexes and set how many listings to fetch, from 1 to 1,000
- Adjustable request intervals — Set a minimum and maximum wait between listings (1~30 seconds each), and it pauses for a random time in that range. The default is 2~5 seconds. Pacing requests is what gets the run to the end
- Progress on screen — Overall progress, the current step, the listing number and one log line per completed listing. In a long job, progress you cannot see looks the same as a stall
- Stops after repeated failures — Collection stops when consecutive failures pass a set limit. That is better than filling the file with empty rows
- Two Excel files — A summary sheet ready to read, and a table with every field of the raw data expanded. The summary sheet has a fixed set of 34 columns, with empty columns and duplicate rows removed. The expanded table’s column count depends on the listings collected (the two files in the delivery folder have 428 and 696)
- No installation — One executable, no Python install and no command line. On launch it finds a free port and opens the browser automatically
Results
Choose the complexes and press the button. Listings are collected one by one, and the Excel files land in a folder when the run finishes. “Open Excel folder” on the screen opens it directly.
See more work built the same way under Web data collection.