Introducing Area Type Filter: Because Not Everyone Starts with a Postcode

We built Jitty to reflect how people actually decide where to live - not just by location or bedroom counts, but by the shape of their lives, the places they need to reach and the feeling they want when they get there.

One thing we’ve learned was that for a lot of buyers, it doesn’t start with a postcode at all.

It starts with a much broader question:

“Where could we live that has the vibe and lifestyle we want?”

That’s not always easy to translate into a property search. But we’re working to make it simpler and simpler to answer that question. The Area Type filter is another step toward doing exactly that.

Why we built it

The way people move is changing. Remote work, rising prices and lifestyle shifts mean more buyers are open to casting a wider net. You might not know exactly which town you want, or even which county. You just know you don’t want to be in a dense city anymore. Or that you absolutely do.

Up until now, the only way to explore that using a property portal was to pick locations one by one, hoping you’d stumble across the kind of place you had in mind. This required you having to know exactly which locations fit the bill...which obviously you don't always know.

We built the Area Type filter to help solve that problem.

What is the Area Type filter?

The Area Type filter lets you look for properties by the vibe of the area, not just its name on a map.

You can filter for:

• Urban — city centres and major conurbations
• Town or Village — smaller towns, market villages, accessible communities
• Rural — countryside, hamlets and truly remote areas

Pick what you’re looking for in the filter drawer or write it straight into the search bar.

It’s especially powerful when you combine it with Travel Time Search. For example:

“Anywhere rural within an hour of London by public transport with at least three bedrooms.”

You’ll see every pocket of countryside that meets your criteria - including places you’d never have thought to search for because you didn't know about them.

How we classify areas

Behind the scenes, we use detailed data from PropertyData to understand the real character of each place.

Every listing is tagged based on official classifications like:

• urban_major_conurbation
• rural_village
• accessible_small_town

We group them into clear, simple categories:

• Urban
• Town or Village
• Rural

That you can filter your search by.

Why it matters

When you’re deciding where to live, the postcode is often not something that matters.

You care that:

• it doesn’t feel cut off.
• the train gets you to Victoria in under an hour.
• it’s a place you can actually picture yourself in.

The Area Type Filter helps you:

• discover locations you’d never have considered.
• compare properties from multiple locations in a single search.
• filter out areas that don’t fit your lifestyle, even if you don’t know their names.

The bigger picture

This is one of many steps we’re taking to give buyers more agency in describing what they want - so they can find the exact home that fits their uniquely specific criteria.

Searching by travel time. By area type. By the life you actually want to build.

Because the best home isn’t always in a place you’ve heard of, or even thought to consider.

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