Alex d1 Just noticed your site must have been down when googlebot last visited, check the cached page returned to see http://66.102.9.104/search?q=cache:umMlnwZXJNgJ:www.propertygr.com/+property+gr&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1 This maybe why they reverted to ODP description
It's a transition effect, and yes it's used as a Meta. I believe it only works in IE, and many people (wrongly) believe putting a low duration of 0.3 or similar does faster page loads.