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Home » WPML Documentation » A List of Multilingual-Ready Themes, Compatible with WPML » Creating Multilingual Real Estate Sites With Houzez Theme and WPML

Creating Multilingual Real Estate Sites With Houzez Theme and WPML

Dean Jones
Updated
September 19, 2023

Houzez is a popular WordPress real estate theme that allows you to manage property listings with a wide range of options and customizations. Using WPML and Houzez, you can build multilingual real estate websites.

On This Page:

Getting Started

Start by installing and activating the following:

  • Houzez theme
  • WPML core plugin and WPML String Translation add-on

If you’re new to WPML, check out our Getting Started Guide. It quickly walks you through different translation options you can use.

WPML’s Translate Everything Automatically mode allows you to automatically translate your whole site. However, at the moment, the Houzez theme doesn’t fully support this mode. We’re working with the theme’s authors to solve this soon.

Translating Posts and Pages

Houzez comes bundled with Elementor, which is fully compatible with WPML. You can translate posts and pages built with Elementor just like you would translate regular posts and pages.  

Translating Properties, Agencies and Agents

The Houzez theme comes with some built-in post types like Properties, Agencies, and Agents. Translating them requires some extra steps as detailed below.

Below, we’ll show you how to translate a property. You can use these steps to translate other post types provided by the Houzez theme.

To translate a property and its fields, edit it and click the plus icon in the right sidebar’s Language section.

Editing a Property post with its many custom fields coming from the Houzez theme

You are taken to the WPML Advanced Translation Editor to add your translations.

Translating a Property post using WPML’s Advanced Translation Editor

Once you have added and confirmed translations for each field, click Complete. Now, we need to translate the remaining strings.

Translating Property Labels via String Translation

As you can see from the above example, there are some property labels that do not appear in the Translation Editor. These texts can be translated via String Translation. 

Making the Property Labels Translatable

To make the property labels translatable, go to Theme Options page and click the Translation tab.

Go to the WPML → Theme and Plugins Localization page. Select and scan the Houzez theme in the Strings in the themes section.

Translating the Property Labels

Now, you can proceed to translate the labels:

  1. Go to WPML → String Translation and select the admin_texts_houzez_options domain. 
  2. Now, search for strings that you would like to translate. You will notice there are multiple entries for the same label. You need to translate only the ones whose names follow this format: [houzez_options]sps_XXXX (where “XXXX” is the last part of the name).
Translating the property labels from the WPML String Translation screen

For example, if you want to translate the “Description” string, follow the steps above and look for the [houzez_options]sps_description name. Click the plus icon to add the translation.

Translating the “Description” text string coming from the Houzez theme

Once saved, the translated version of this label will appear on the front-end of your Property posts when switching to the secondary language. 

You can follow this same process to translate any remaining labels or strings coming from the theme. For more information, check out our page about translating texts using String Translation. 

Assigning a Translated Property to an Agent

When you translate a Property page, it doesn’t get automatically assigned to the translated version of the Agent profile. You have to connect them yourself.

You must translate both the Property and the Agent to be able to connect them.

Use the following steps to assign a translated property to an agent:

  1. Edit the property in the secondary language. To do this, you can navigate to the list of Properties in the admin and then use the language switcher in the top admin bar to switch to that language.
List of Property posts in the Houzez theme
  1. When you select to edit the property, a warning message appears to let you know that you are trying to edit the translation using the WordPress default editor. Dismiss the message by clicking the Edit anyway button.
Pop-up dialog warning you that you’re editing a translation
  1. Select the Contact Information tab in the Houzez settings panel. Select the Agent Info option and then the translated version of the Agent profile.
Assigning a translated Property to a translated Agent
  1. Click the Update button.

Translating Taxonomies  

Houzez comes with the following custom taxonomies: 

  • Type
  • Status
  • Features
  • Labels
  • Country
  • State
  • City
  • Area

Some categories and tags (taxonomies) assigned to posts and properties will appear for translation while translating the page using the Advanced Translation Editor.

Custom Houzez taxonomies can be translated with WPML’s Taxonomy Translation. 

  1. Go to the WPML → Taxonomy Translation.
  2. In the dropdown on the top of the page, select the taxonomy you would like to translate.
    For example, you could select Houzez’ Labels. When you do that, a window will appear showing the available terms to translate.
Translating Houzez custom taxonomies from the WPML Taxonomy Translation screen
  1. To add a translation to a term, simply click the plus icon for it. A pop-up dialog appears and you can enter the translation.
Translating a taxonomy term coming from the Houzez theme
  1. Click Save.

Continue the same process for all of our remaining taxonomies.

Make sure to translate the taxonomy name and slug in the section at the bottom of the translations panel (see below). This will ensure that the name of the taxonomy will also appear translated in URLs and other sections of your site. 

Translating the main taxonomy name and slug

Setting the Translation Preference for Fields Builder

You can add your own custom fields to properties, including Text, Number, Checkbox and more. To do this, go to Houzez → Fields Builder and click Add New.

Setting up custom fields for properties in the Houzez theme

To be able to translate these custom fields, you need to make them translatable. Learn about how to do this in our guide about translating custom fields.

Translating Menus

With WPML, you can easily synchronize your menus across the different languages that you have on your website. For details, check out our guide on translating menus.

Known Issues

Current unresolved issues:

You can also search all known issues including previously resolved issues for this theme.