California-based Great Park Neighborhoods' new marketing campaign is using cutting-edge technology to help buyers personalize their home search.

Its "Find Your Home" campaign kicked off this summer at the grand opening of Great Park Neighborhoods' Beacon Park community. Using customized technology-enabled keychains, more than 25,000 Beacon Park visitors were able to tour 47 new model homes and collect information about their favorite models. By scanning the keychains over bright orange beacons in the models, visitors created a personalized new-home brochure for easy access on a computer or handheld device. The program relies on radio frequency identification (RFID) technology, something typically used by retailers for monitoring inventory.

The virtual online model home brochures generated by RFID is a first for the housing industry, says Jann Rowe, vice president of marketing for FivePoint, the community's developer.

“With just a tap of a personalized keychain, homeshoppers left the grand opening knowing they could continue to explore and compare their favorite floor plans on any computer, tablet or mobile device,” she says.

After registering upon arrival, guests were greeted with a convenient, bright-orange keychain, containing an RFID chip synced with their e-mail addresses and a unique web portal. By simply tapping their keychains to beacon scanners set up throughout all the model homes, details were automatically saved in a personal online dashboard. This allowed users to collect information about the floorplans and review and compare them when it is convenient. 

For every keychain chip given to guests, a unique identifier was set up to ensure that their personal web portal only contains the information they want. Once they sign-in to their dashboard, guests will receive fundamental information about the floor plans they scanned including number of bedrooms, baths, floor plan prices, pictures, and much more. The web portal is constantly updated, making sure home shoppers have the most up-to-date information about their favorite floor plans.

Builders at Beacon Park include D.R. Horton, K. Hovnanian, Lennar, Pulte, Richmond American, Ryland, Shea, Standard Pacific, Taylor Morrison, and Warmington Residential.