Why Real Estate Agents need this
Search for a neighborhood plus "homes for sale" and the first screen usually belongs to the national portals, whose backlinks and authority let them appear in both national and local results. Real estate also falls under the stricter trust standards Google applies to money-related topics, so an independent agent starts behind. Add an IDX feed that republishes the same MLS text as every other agent's site, with listing URLs that change when a property's status does, and the pages carrying your name often struggle. What you can control is the small, checkable part: whether your homepage and contact page state who you are, where your office is and how to call you in a form crawlers can read. The Local SEO Audit fetches one live URL and reports whether your address, phone, LocalBusiness schema, map link, opening hours, email and social links are present, and compares your name if you type it. It will not make you outrank a portal, but it shows whether the basics behind real estate local SEO are in place before you spend time on anything bigger.
Real Estate Agents specific guidance
What to run first
Start with your homepage, then run the contact or office page separately, because the tool reads one URL per run and sees the HTML as served, with no JavaScript executed and no login. If your IDX plugin or theme injects the office address through a script, it may not appear here even though visitors see it. In the next ten minutes, open your contact page, view the page source and search it for your phone number and the word address. Then fill in the optional fields for the business name, phone and address on your Google profile, copied exactly as shown there, so the Business Profile match block can compare them with the page. A clean run says nothing about your Google Business Profile itself, because the tool never reads it.
Reading the score and the rows
The score is the share of weighted checks passed across three groups: NAP and identity, maps and hours, and trust and social. Check the summary cards first. NAP complete showing Partial usually means the phone number or a street address is missing from the page text. Local schema showing No means no LocalBusiness or Organization markup and no typed JSON-LD node carrying an address or geo was found; a subtype such as RealEstateAgent counts when it has an address. Geo coordinates are optional, so that row matters least. The Business Profile match block is unscored, and a phone mismatch lists the numbers it found, which makes an old office number easy to spot. A high score does not show citations, reviews or map-pack position.
What to fix, and in which order
Fix the phone and address first: plain text on the contact page and in the footer, with the phone wrapped in a tel: link. Next add LocalBusiness JSON-LD, generating it with the Schema Generator and confirming it parses with the Schema Checker. After that add a Google Maps embed or directions link, your office hours and a contact email, and leave the social profile links for last. Re-run the same URL after each change so you can see which row moved. None of this indexes a page or lifts a ranking, and it does nothing for thin IDX listing pages, which need a separate content check.
Example scenarios
1. Solo agent with an IDX-heavy homepage
- Situation
- Illustrative example: A solo agent runs a WordPress site with an IDX plugin. The homepage is a search box and featured listings, and the footer holds only a logo and a contact form.
- Input
https://www.example-realty.com/- Reading the result
- Expect NAP complete to read Partial, Local schema to read No, and the address, hours and map rows to appear in the issue list, plus phone unless a long listing number happens to look like one. A score of roughly 30 percent or lower would follow. Add the office details to the footer first, then schema.
2. Phone number baked into a banner image
- Situation
- Illustrative example: The contact page header is a designed 1200 by 300 pixel image that shows the office phone number as part of the picture, while the text on the page only offers a form.
- Input
https://www.example-realty.com/contact/- Reading the result
- The Phone number row would fail because the tool finds no number in the text. If you typed your profile phone, the match block would report it as not on the page. A score near 60 percent would be plausible if the address, schema and map link are fine. Replace the image text with a tel: link and run the page again.
3. Two-office team with a suite number mismatch
- Situation
- Illustrative example: A small brokerage has a page for each office. The profile address reads 412 Harbor Street, Suite 3, but the page shows only 412 Harbor St in the footer.
- Input
https://www.example-realty.com/offices/harbor-street/- Reading the result
- St and Street count as the same, but the suite's 3 counts as a house number that must be present, so the address row would likely warn with about 60 percent of the words found. Add the suite to the page text and the schema address, then compare again.
Common mistakes
- Testing only the homepage. The contact and office pages often carry most of the NAP detail, and each run covers one URL, so a clean homepage can hide a bare contact page.
- Treating the score as a ranking forecast. The score counts on-page local signals and says nothing about how you will place against portals or other agents in the local results.
- Typing a different name into the match fields. If you enter a shortened name or an old address instead of what your Google profile shows, the Business Profile match block reports a mismatch that is really your typing.
- Pasting schema that contradicts the page. JSON-LD with an old phone or a different suite number than the visible text creates the very inconsistency you were trying to remove.
- Assuming the audit covers IDX pages. A listing page can pass the local checks and still be thin, duplicated MLS text that never gets indexed, which is a separate problem.
Frequently asked questions
Can seo for realtors work if Zillow already outranks my site?
Portals do dominate the share of voice through backlinks and authority, so beating them on broad terms is unrealistic for most independent agents. What you can do is make your site clear on the local basics and aim at neighborhood-level phrases they do not own. The Local SEO Audit covers the first part by reporting whether your address, phone and schema are readable on a page. It cannot predict rankings, and a good score is only a foundation.
Does the Local SEO Audit check my IDX listing pages?
It reads one URL per run, so you can paste a listing page, but it only checks local business signals such as address, phone, schema and map links. It does not judge whether the listing text is duplicated MLS content or whether the page is indexed. Run it on your homepage and contact page for the business details, and use a thin content or duplicate text check for the IDX pages.
Should my address on the site match my Google Business Profile exactly?
Yes, keep the name, address and phone consistent, including the suite number and the abbreviations you actually use. Type those three values from your profile into the optional fields and the tool compares them with the page text and schema. St and Street count as the same, and country code and spacing in phone numbers are ignored, but every house number must be present. It compares only against what you type, not the live profile.
How do I add LocalBusiness schema for real estate local SEO?
Generate LocalBusiness JSON-LD with the Schema Generator, filling in your business name, street address, phone and, if you want, hours and a Google Maps link. Paste it into your homepage and contact page through your theme's custom code area or an SEO plugin's header scripts box, then run the audit again. Any LocalBusiness subtype counts when the node carries an address or geo. Finish by confirming the syntax with the Schema Checker.
I work from home, so should I publish my address on my real estate website?
That decision is yours, and the audit cannot make it for you. The address check looks for the word address plus a street word in the page source, so a page without one will fail that row and show NAP as Partial. You can still pass the phone, hours, email, social and schema rows, and your score simply reflects the missing address. Whatever you publish should match your Google profile.
Reference: The Ahrefs guide to competing with big real estate sites shows how portals take most of the share of voice, which is why independent agents need to get their local basics right.