Irvine, CA -- New home buyers out West are voracious Internet information consumers who are twice as likely as their resale home-buying counterparts to use the Internet to find a home.

Revealing why new home developers need to be at least as cyber savvy as the resale industry, 61.6 percent of new home buyers in three Western states said they browsed for housing and related information, a 29 percent increase over last year and far more than resale shoppers, according to "Vision 2000: Designing the Next Generation of Homes," recently published by: National Survey Systems, Color Design Art, Market Perspectives and The Meyers Group.

Internet use among resale home buyers in California was only 30.7 percent in the first quarter of 2000, up from 28 percent for the same period a year ago, according to the California Association of Realtors, which offers the only comparable study of resale buyers, but only in California.

Earlier this year, Meyers surveyed 1,471 new home shoppers from nine California regions as well 297 from Las Vegas and 105 from Phoenix.

Among those surveyed, 96 percent said they owned one or more computers at home, 93 percent of those computer owners had an Internet connection and 69 percent of Internet connected new home buyers said they used the Net for new home information. That calculates to 61.1 percent of all new home buyers using the Web for new home shopping.

Meyers conducted the survey to determine not only Internet use, but the motivations, perceptions and preferences of new home shoppers. Most of those surveyed, 80 percent, were move-up buyers. Twenty percent were first-time buyers.

Anticipated price appreciation and a builder's reputation where the most compelling reasons buyers chose a given new home, according to Meyers, which also publishes U.S. Housing Markets, quarterly housing starts information for 331 metropolitan areas.

New home buyers most often visited Shea Homes', Pardee Homes', Centex Homes' and Kaufman & Broad's Web sites.

The study also said most buyers preferred a two-story home over a single-story home, but those who preferred a single-story weren't willing to accept less than 2,103 square feet.

In line with new home buyers' heavily-wired status, the most sought-after features in a new home were one extra electrical outlet and one extra phone jack in a secondary bedroom or office; and pre-wired, high-speed Internet access.

Additional Internet-related findings about new home shoppers included:

• 61 percent used the Net for mortgage information, up from 19 percent.
• 62 percent used the Net for city or community information, up from 37 percent.
• 43 percent used the Net for school information, up from 20 percent.
• 20 percent visited the Shea Homes Web site, the most commonly visited new home builder site.
• Other than new home related Web sites, new home shoppers most often frequent news/information, reference/research, stocks/financial and travel planning/reservations Web sites.
• 70 percent said it was "extremely important" for new home Web sites to have "virtual" model home tours.
• 36 percent of all new home shoppers said it was "extremely important" to be able to contact builder sales and service representatives by e-mail, compared to 46 percent for detached, luxury home shoppers.