Richard Barton, the founder of Expedia, wants to repeat the success of the online travel agency in the fast-growing market for US property websites, by opening up his Zillow.com to user-generated content similar to popular networking sites such as MySpace.

The move, to be announced today, will allow home-owners and estate agents to add properties’ photos, descriptions, improvements and selling price to Zillow – the company founded by Mr Barton in February.