5 tech services to make moving a snap

— -- Nobody likes apartment hunting. It can be fiercely competitive, utterly exhausting and mind-numbingly long. Fret not, for we have found five tech services, websites and apps to make the process slightly less painful.

Padmapper

Scroll through the rental listings of Craigslist, and your eyes begin to glaze over. Wouldn't it be great if these results were filtered to your specifications and plotted on a map? Turns out there's a service that does that and more. Padmapper aggregates housing listings from Craigslist, Apartments.com, Rent.com and other websites, overlaying them on Google Maps. Filters let you see only the results that matter, allowing you to set a rent range, the number of bedrooms and bathrooms, type of housing (leases, sublets, rooms/shares) and even work commute times.

When you click on a listing, Padmapper will show you a preview of the original rental post, a Google Street View map of the address and Walk Score (realtor speak for pedestrian friendliness) all from the same page. The service can also email you new results on an hourly or daily basis. An optional profile is especially handy when you're emailing prospective landlords from the site, appending your renter profile (name, email, phone number, about me, pets, employment, desired move-in date, ideal viewing times and credit score) at the end of the message. A fabulous, comprehensive service to tackle the soul-draining apartment hunting process, Padmapper is a must try.

StreetAdvisor

If you're moving to a new city, it can be hard to narrow down what neighborhoods you want to live in. StreetAdvisor leverages the power of local knowledge to compile descriptions, photos, reviews and ratings. The platform — a cross between Yelp and Quora, but for real estate — highlights the pros, cons and demographics of different neighborhoods. If users want more information, they can ask locals for advice, everything from nearby bar suggestions to concerns about crime in the area. The website's filters allow users to quickly find a 'hood best suited for them.

RentSocial

Proclaiming itself to be the future of renting, RentSocial adds a social layer to the housing experience. Leveraging your social graph through Facebook Connect, the service lets apartment hunters share listings with roommates or friends. Current tenants can also use RentSocial to leave reviews, submit maintenance requests and pay rent. Furthermore, the service can connect residents of a building to help foster a sense of community. RentSocial doesn't have the most comprehensive listings, but the tools it offers are appealing for the socially minded.

Homesnap

Thinking about foregoing rental altogether? If you're in the market to buy, HomeSnap is a useful app to learn more about the homes you come across in real life.

When you take a photo of a residence with the free iOS app, HomeSnap uses the phone's GPS, accelerometer, gyroscope and other sensors to determine location and orientation. In addition, it pulls data from real-estate listings and public records to compile comprehensive information about a home — even if it's not on the market. The app can tell you the number of bedrooms and bathrooms, square footage, value, date of last sale and more. HomeSnap has more than 90 million homes in its database. If the property in question is for sale, the app will show the listing price, interior pictures and can even help schedule a showing.

Updater

Once you've found a new home, it's time to take care of logistics. Here to help is Updater, a one-stop shop for customizable checklists to keep you organized, postal address changes, easy sign-ups for utilities and moving discounts.

The interactive planner also includes a junk mail feature that will help you opt-out of marketing lists and snail mail spam, which means no more pesky pre-approved credit card applications. Updater's privacy pledge details the data it collects on users, but the company vows never to sell any private information. Your information is only shared with the individuals, businesses or organizations you expressly consented to do so.

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E-mail Alice Truong at techcomments@usatoday.com. Follow her on Twitter: @alicetruong.