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How Technology Connects Home Buyers & Sellers with Real Estate Agents

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#realestate #privateresidential #property #homebuyers
Published
07/19/2022

“How did people ever used to do X?” is a standard line you hear in the digital age, applying to everything from researching a college paper to investing in a retirement plan. It’s true: technology has facilitated some significant strides in convenience in the past two decades. The world is a lot more streamlined, efficient and friction-free.

For a long time, the real estate industry stood alone as a noticeable hold-out to technological change, preferring to operate in the old, manual, low-tech ways it always had. If you wanted to connect with a real estate agent like Chinneck Shaw, you had to defer to family friends for recommendations and the Yellow Pages for phone numbers. You couldn’t really vet agents for quality, or compare commission rates. And when it came time to dialogue with your agent, you had to hope they had their phone nearby.

However, technology is finally changing that. Various technological solutions for business process automation are now being adopted in the real estate business. Business owners with a technology management course background utilize technology to drive a competitive advantage for company operations.

Here are a few recent advancements in tech that have helped connect home buyers and sellers with real estate agents.

The Digital Marketplace

Finding the right real estate agent used to be a frustratingly restrictive process. Yes, you had choices. But with agent commission fees opaque, qualifications unclear and sales histories all but impossible to track down, it was an artificial sense of choice – a blind stab at what you hoped would be a beneficial relationship.

Nobul is helping to overturn that dynamic. The real estate digital marketplace uses an AI-powered algorithm to match buyers/sellers with the right real estate agents. Then, agents can compete for a consumer’s business, often by offering competitive commission rates. As CEO Regan McGee puts it, Nobul “is all about transparency and empowerment for homebuyers.”

New Modes of Communication

The agent-consumer relationship needs to be built on fast, effective communication. A lag in communication can mean the difference between pouncing on an offer deadline at the right time and letting a great opportunity slip through the cracks.

Thankfully, modes of communication between agents and consumers are improving. The industry is seeing increased adoption of basic tech like IM services and video conferencing software, as well as industry-specific solutions like listings dashboards and document sharing. According to Jaime Baker of Baker & Co, you can attribute this change to shifting real estate demographics: “I have found a lot of millennials and younger generations prefer DMs and are more responsive to this avenue of communication.” Some digital marketplaces, like Nobul (mentioned above), even incorporate chat and listings-sharing functionalities in their platform.

Virtual Property Viewings

According to Business Insider, remote homebuying (i.e., sight-unseen sales) skyrocketed since the advent of the pandemic, showing little sign of abating. To help facilitate remote buying, many agents began leveraging VR technology for property viewings.

VR is a fantastic workaround for consumers who want to view as many options as possible, but can’t – or do not want to – physically attend multiple viewings. It helps connect consumers with their agents throughout the consideration process, allowing them to easily and engagingly evaluate their choices together.

How did people ever buy and sell properties before? Technology has made it simpler to find the right real estate agent, communicate with an agent, and attend multiple property viewings.

 

Discover how technology connects home buyers and sellers with real estate agents with a comprehensive section-by-section guide provided by eXp Realty. Learn about the latest tech trends transforming the real estate industry.

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