Why did I create Locus Quarter and why it should help you

I was actively searching for houses, to buy one. 10's of houses on various house search websites like funda.nl. When we search for a house/property, we also try to find out what are the things near that property, that are important to us. Like: Grocery, Bus stop, School etc. These preferences, vary from person to person.

Every time, I liked a house, I had to open Google Maps, put in the house address, search for places around me with different criteria, time taken to reach destinations, mode of transport and so on.

Well, I thought, as I know, what to search for, in the houses like price range, location etc and also places/amenities near by, can I not automate this?

Now, when I wake up in the morning, I have an email which

Filtered list of the houses based on my criteria
The places/amenities near that house
Distance and travel time to those places in various modes of transport
Distance to my office (a place where you go almost everyday)

Table of contents

Why did I create Locus Quarter and why it should help you
Features of Locus Quarter
Sources used
Getting started
Execute & Enjoy the results
Sample Output

Features of Locus Quarter

House/Property preferences
- Search houses in single/multiple localities
- Price range for the localities
- Can be easily enhanced to add/remove other search criterias as well
Places/Amenities near the house/property
- Types of places/amenities like, school, supermarket etc
- Mode of travel from the house to those places/amenities like, Cycling, Walking etc
- Number of such amenities to be found
Fixed Address (like Office) and mode of travel to those fixed addresses
Email on or off and Email to multiple receipients using GMail

Sources used

RSS Feeds of funda.nl
Google Maps API's
Gmail API's

Getting started

Get your Google API Key

Get your Google API key to access Google Maps & Geolocation Services - Select Maps, Routes, Directions (all options)
Note: Google API has now imposed limits on free usage for the developer community, check your quota limits and use it cautiously.

Configuring GMail for Email (Optional)

Note: Email is optional (default off). I have done this since I found the setup of gmail, tricky for beginners

Enable your GMail API from your account - Save the credentials.json/client_secret.json (filename as defined in your configuration file)
gmail-python-quickstart.json - Generate this and save it as filename as defined in your configuration file. This file contains access token and refresh token

Baseline configuration before execution

Use Python 3.7
Install dependencies (in an virtual env, if you please to and use python 3.7)
```
pip install -r requirements.txt
```
Update the config-locus-quarter.ini with the API Key
Update the config-locus-quarter.ini as per your search criteria (Example in the repository as example-config-locus-quarter.ini)

Execute & Enjoy the results

Retrieve details from the RSS feeds (URL configured)

python locus_quarter.py

Retrieve details only for specific address

python locus_quarter.py --address="Henriette Bosmanslaan 2, 1187 HH Amstelveen, Netherlands"

You can have multiple configuration files, by default config-locus-quarter.ini is referenced. To use a customized configuration file named config-mini-locus-quarter.ini

python locus_quarter.py --config="config-mini-locus-quarter.ini"

Combining address and customized configuration file

python locus_quarter.py --config="config-mini-locus-quarter.ini" --address="Henriette Bosmanslaan 2, 1187 HH Amstelveen, Netherlands"

If you have configured your email using GMail, you can get emails by adding a flag --email=true :

python locus_quarter.py --email=true #Retrieve details from the RSS feeds

python locus_quarter.py --config="config-mini-locus-quarter.ini" --email=true #Specific configuration file based

python locus_quarter.py --config="config-mini-locus-quarter.ini" --address="Henriette Bosmanslaan 2, 1187 HH Amstelveen, Netherlands" --email=true #Specific configiration file and specific address

Sample Output

The email will have a nice subject, Locus Quater. It can be sent to mutiple receipients. Output can also be watched on the console.

+-------------------------------------------------------------+
Henriëtte Bosmanslaan 2, 1187 HH Amstelveen, Netherlands
+-------------------------------------------------------------+

Facility Type:grocery_or_supermarket
Facility Name:Olivier's Bakkerskar
Travel type:walking Distance:0.9 km Time:11 mins
Travel type:transit Distance:0.9 km Time:11 mins
Travel type:bicycling Distance:0.9 km Time:2 mins
Facility Type:grocery_or_supermarket
Facility Name:AH Maalderij
Travel type:walking Distance:0.7 km Time:9 mins
Travel type:transit Distance:0.7 km Time:9 mins
Travel type:bicycling Distance:0.8 km Time:2 mins

Facility Type:transit_station
Facility Name:Amstelveen, Sacharovlaan
Travel type:walking Distance:0.4 km Time:5 mins
Travel type:transit Distance:0.4 km Time:5 mins
Travel type:bicycling Distance:0.4 km Time:1 min
Facility Type:transit_station
Facility Name:Amstelveen, Noorddammerweg
Travel type:walking Distance:0.5 km Time:6 mins
Travel type:transit Distance:0.5 km Time:6 mins
Travel type:bicycling Distance:0.5 km Time:1 min

Facility Type:school
Facility Name:AmstelWijs, stichting voor openbaar primair onderwijs
Travel type:walking Distance:0.9 km Time:11 mins
Travel type:transit Distance:0.9 km Time:11 mins
Travel type:bicycling Distance:0.9 km Time:2 mins
Facility Type:school
Facility Name:Public Elementary School De Westwijzer
Travel type:walking Distance:0.7 km Time:9 mins
Travel type:transit Distance:0.7 km Time:9 mins
Travel type:bicycling Distance:0.7 km Time:2 mins

Fixed Addresses
Travel type:transit To:Claude Debussylaan 88, 1077 XX Amsterdam, Netherlands Distance:8.4 km Time:28 mins
Travel type:transit To:Bijlmerdreef 101, 1102 BP Amsterdam, Netherlands Distance:11.6 km Time:45 mins
Travel type:driving To:Claude Debussylaan 88, 1077 XX Amsterdam, Netherlands Distance:8.1 km Time:15 mins
Travel type:driving To:Bijlmerdreef 101, 1102 BP Amsterdam, Netherlands Distance:10.9 km Time:18 mins
Travel type:bicycling To:Claude Debussylaan 88, 1077 XX Amsterdam, Netherlands Distance:7.8 km Time:25 mins
Travel type:bicycling To:Bijlmerdreef 101, 1102 BP Amsterdam, Netherlands Distance:11.5 km Time:38 mins
+-------------------------------------------------------------+

arnabsinha4u / locus-quarter