Planning a move? Got school-aged kids? You're about to bump up against a major headache: finding a home in a neighborhood with the best possible schools. Thanks to YDN, Local Search, and Yahoo! Real Estate, however, life just got a little bit easier.

Yahoo! Real Estate yesterday launched a new nationwide school search feature that allows readers to search and browse schools using a map interface, as well as refine and sort by district, distance, grade level, or school type, public, private, or charter. Y!RE partnered with leading non-profit GreatSchools.net for detailed school information, statistics, parent reviews, and links to test scores and related content on the Y! Education/GreatSchools site.

To give users an even better feel for the neighborhood, each school detail page features a neighborhood map that uses the Yahoo! Local API to plot nearby grocery stores, parks, restaurants and other local businesses with user ratings.

Kent Brewster