imot.bg CLI

A command-line tool for scraping, storing, and querying Bulgarian real estate listings from imot.bg.

Quick Reference

# Build
go build -o imot ./cmd/imot/

# Search (live from imot.bg, no storage)
./imot search --city София --neighborhood Лозенец --type "2-стаен" --pages 1 --json

# Sync (scrape + store in local SQLite at ~/.imot/imot.db)
./imot sync --city София --neighborhood Лозенец --type "2-стаен" --pages 0

# Query local database
./imot local --city София --type "2-стаен" --neighborhood Лозенец --json

# Statistics
./imot stats --city София --neighborhood Лозенец

# Direct SQL
./imot sql "SELECT type, count(*) FROM listings GROUP BY type"

# Watch for new listings (polls every 30 min)
./imot watch --city София --neighborhood Лозенец --type "2-стаен" --interval 30m

Commands

search

Scrapes imot.bg live and outputs results to stdout. Does NOT store in database.

Flag	Type	Description
--city	string	Required. Bulgarian city name (e.g. София, Варна, Пловдив)
--neighborhood	string	Neighborhood name. Accepts Bulgarian (Лозенец) or transliterated (lozenets). Partial match.
--type	string	Property type in Bulgarian (see Type Reference below)
--pages	int	Number of pages to fetch. 0 = all pages (auto-detect). 1 = first page only.
--min-price	int	Minimum price in EUR
--max-price	int	Maximum price in EUR
--min-sqm	int	Minimum size in sq.m
--max-sqm	int	Maximum size in sq.m
--rent	bool	Search rentals instead of sales
--json	bool	JSON output (for piping/programmatic use)
--agent	bool	Terse one-line format optimized for LLM consumption
--quiet	bool	Only show count + average price

sync

Same flags as search. Scrapes imot.bg and stores results in local SQLite (~/.imot/imot.db). Deduplicates by hash — running twice adds 0 new listings.

local

Queries the local SQLite database with same filter flags. Does NOT hit imot.bg.

stats

Computes price statistics from local data: count, average, median, min, max, price/sqm, neighborhood breakdown.

sql

Execute arbitrary SQL against ~/.imot/imot.db. Useful for ad-hoc analytics.

watch

Polls imot.bg at regular intervals and reports new listings not previously seen.

Flag	Type	Description
--interval	duration	Check interval (e.g. 5m, 30m, 1h). Default: 30m.

cities

Lists all supported cities and their URL slugs.

Type Reference

Residential

Bulgarian	CLI flag	URL slug
1-стаен	"1-стаен"	ednostaen
2-стаен	"2-стаен"	dvustaen
3-стаен	"3-стаен"	tristaen
4-стаен	"4-стаен"	chetiristaen
многостаен	"многостаен"	mnogostaen
мезонет	"мезонет"	mezonet
къща	"къща"	kashta

Commercial

Bulgarian	CLI flag	URL slug
офис	"офис"	ofis
магазин	"магазин"	magazin
заведение	"заведение"	zavedenie
склад	"склад"	sklad

Parking

Bulgarian	CLI flag	URL slug
гараж / паркомясто	"гараж"	garazh-parkomyasto

Note: гараж and паркомясто are separate subtypes on imot.bg but share the same search filter. The CLI extracts both as separate types (ГАРАЖ and ПАРКОМЯСТО).

Land

Bulgarian	CLI flag	URL slug
парцел	"парцел"	place-za-stroezh
земя	"земя"	zemedelska-zemya

Data Schema

Each listing has these fields:

Field	JSON key	Type	Description
ID	id	string	Extracted from imot.bg URL (e.g. 1b177425523801314)
Type	type	string	Uppercase Bulgarian (e.g. 2-СТАЕН, МАГАЗИН)
City	city	string	Bulgarian city name (e.g. София)
Neighborhood	neighborhood	string	Bulgarian neighborhood name (e.g. Лозенец)
Price EUR	price_eur	int	Price in euros. 0 if not listed.
Price BGN	price_bgn	int	Price in leva.
Size	size_sqm	int	Area in square meters
Floor	floor	string	Floor info (e.g. 3 от 5, Партер). Empty if not parseable.
Year Built	year_built	string	Year or range (e.g. 2007, 1960-1969, under construction)
Description	description	string	Truncated to 500 chars from search page card. Full description available on detail page (not yet extracted).
Phone	phone	string	Agent/owner phone. May be truncated (e.g. 0899) if imot.bg shows partial number.
Agency	agency	string	Agency name. Empty string = owner listing.
URL	url	string	Full imot.bg listing URL
Scraped At	scraped_at	string	ISO 8601 timestamp

SQLite Database

Location: ~/.imot/imot.db

Tables

listings — deduplicated by hash (type + city + neighborhood + price + size + floor + phone)

Column	Type	Notes
id	INTEGER	Auto-increment PK
listing_hash	TEXT	FNV-1a hash for dedup
type	TEXT	Uppercase Bulgarian
city	TEXT
neighborhood	TEXT
price_eur	INTEGER
price_bgn	INTEGER
price_per_sqm	REAL	Generated column
size_sqm	INTEGER
floor	TEXT
year_built	TEXT
description	TEXT
phone	TEXT
agency	TEXT
url	TEXT
first_seen_at	DATETIME
last_seen_at	DATETIME	Updated on re-sync
price_history	TEXT	JSON array of price changes

sync_log — records each sync operation

Column	Type
city	TEXT
property_type	TEXT
pages_scraped	INTEGER
listings_found	INTEGER
new_listings	INTEGER
scraped_at	DATETIME

Useful Queries

-- Count by type
SELECT type, count(*) FROM listings GROUP BY type ORDER BY count(*) DESC;

-- Price stats per neighborhood
SELECT neighborhood, count(*), avg(price_eur), min(price_eur), max(price_eur)
FROM listings WHERE price_eur > 0 GROUP BY neighborhood;

-- Owner listings (no agency)
SELECT * FROM listings WHERE agency = '' OR agency IS NULL;

-- Recently added
SELECT * FROM listings ORDER BY first_seen_at DESC LIMIT 20;

-- Phone coverage
SELECT count(*), SUM(CASE WHEN phone != '' THEN 1 ELSE 0 END) FROM listings;

Architecture

cmd/imot/main.go        — entry point
internal/
  cli/root.go           — cobra commands, flags, output formatting
  scraper/
    scraper.go          — HTTP client, URL building, neighborhood resolution
    parser.go           — HTML parsing (regex-based), type/floor/year extraction
    types.go            — data structures, city/type/oblast maps
  store/store.go        — SQLite operations, dedup, upsert, price history
  translit/
    translit.go         — Bulgarian ↔ Latin transliteration
    translit_test.go    — transliteration tests

How Parsing Works

1. Fetch HTML from imot.bg search results page (windows-1251 → UTF-8)

2. Split into blocks on class="zaglavie" markers (one per listing card)

3. Extract from each block:

   • URL and ID from <a href="//www.imot.bg/obiava-...">
   • Location from <location>град София, Лозенец</location>
   • Type from title text (e.g. "Продава 2-СТАЕН") — split at first lowercase char to handle glued text like МНОГОСТАЕНград София
   • Prices via regex: ([0-9 ]+) € and ([0-9 ]+\.[0-9]+) лв
   • Agency from class="name"> link
   • Info section from class="info"> div — comma-separated structured data

4. Info section parsing (the parseInfo function):

   • Phone extracted from end (тел.: marker)
   • Remaining parts scanned for: size (\d+ кв.м), floor (\d+-[тм]и ет. от \d+), year (Въведен в експлоатация \d{4})
   • Non-positional scan: street names can appear between fields, so the parser checks every part against every pattern rather than assuming fixed positions
   • Everything else becomes the description

5. Deduplication: FNV-1a hash of type|city|neighborhood|price|size|floor|phone

Known Limitations

• Description is truncated at 500 chars from the search card. Full description requires fetching each listing's detail page individually (not yet implemented).
• Phone may be truncated: if imot.bg shows a partial number (e.g. 0899), the CLI captures only what's visible.
• Floor regex gaps: patterns like "Партер", "1-ви ет." (instead of "1-ти") may not match. The regex currently handles [digit]-[тм]и ет. format.
• Neighborhood resolution: transliteration first, then POST form fallback. Some neighborhoods may 404 if neither method resolves the correct URL slug.
• Count accuracy: occasionally off by 1 vs imot.bg total (likely dedup hash collision or one listing failing to parse). Observed for 3-стаен (209 vs 210) and магазин (57 vs 58).

Build

Requires Go 1.22+.

go build -o imot ./cmd/imot/

Development

# Run tests
go test ./...

# Build and test a single neighborhood
go build -o imot ./cmd/imot/ && ./imot sync --city София --neighborhood Лозенец --type "2-стаен" --pages 1

# Wipe database and start fresh
rm ~/.imot/imot.db