Is WordPress a viable non-blog site full CMS solution?

[morgatron]

I have a client that needs a property management website created on a budget. It needs property listings, MLS integration, and a database of homeowners’ associations w/user login. The client needs to be able to update and add new listings on their own. I have limited experience with WordPress, but I convinced my boss it can do everything needed, will save us from having to code a custom CMS from scratch, and will be easy enough for the client to use. Did I speak too soon? Your thoughts are appreciated fellow css-tricksters!

[TheDoc]

You are mentioning some relatively advanced things, which might be beyond the scope of WordPress. You can put something together, I’m sure, but it’d be much tidier with WordPress 3.0 (still in Beta last time I checked).

Chris would probably tell you that WordPress is most certainly capable of all sorts of things! :D

I just don’t have any specific experience with real estate sites, especially any MLS integration.

[netxm]

I’m building similar web site, but can’t figure out how to get MLS feed and embed it on the web site. Should real estate firm get paid MLS feature that provides this feed and then I can use IDX or Great real estate plugin… Does someone know anything about it? :geek:

[Luminated]

First off, I would definitely say WP can be a viable non-blog full CMS solution as I’ve already built sites using it and its been wonderful. But it really depends on what you are wanting the Content you want the System to Manage, if you will.

As far as your needs, a quick Google search generated this result:

http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/tags/mls

I would have to say that it will be a stretch (and maybe a hassle, depending on how well you understand WordPress) to get it to do what you are looking to do easily. I would also be concerned that you would be stretching WP’s capabilities so far that it might reduce the expandability factor. While WordPress is always growing, there other systems that can handle what you’re describing easier than WordPress. I don’t think it would require coding a custom CMS from from scratch nor would I reccomend that, not when there’s so many open source platforms out there already.

With that said, I know for a fact that WordPress CAN do just about anything, it just depends on how familiar you are with it and how willing you are to customize it as heavily as you might need to, whereas other CMS solutions could provide those things more or less out of the box, especially the member login/user database.

I would say my first choice would be a custom Drupal install, rather than WordPress.

[JoshWhiteDesign]

I’m currently working with a client whose in a similar situation. We started with an HTML site just to get a web presence up with her real estate business. She has since wanted to move into upgrade into a CMS.

After doing alot of research and looking into it together, I’ve not been real happy with the real estate plugins that exist for WordPress. I think the best way to do this is to create a loop similar to Chris’ homepage with smaller squares, and the posts themselves become the listings.

The client ended up not wanting to go that route because she actually wanted a blog and she then ended up buying a subscription to a very WordPress-friendly IDX that even has a plugin built for it. From what I’m seeing, with the combination of the WP Plugin, and using the custom functions within the IDX to imbed thier data into a page, it may be a pretty viable solution.

I’m almost wondering if the new post category system in WP 3 could accomplish making posts for listings and then having regular blog posts as well.

I’m coming to the conclusion that real estate is just a giant pain in the ass because of how fragmented the IDX systems are :(

[Author]

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