PHOTO: Kylie Davis
It’s the start not just of a new year, but a new decade. With the rise of proptech and so much technology enabling change to what we do and our customer expectations, it’s a great time to reflect on what could happen to real estate over the next five to 10 years.
From dramatically transformed franchise models, the death of the seller-principal model and mega offices dominating property services – here’s my take on how real estate will change over the next decade.
1. The rise of the tech hub — and the transformation of traditional franchise models
Real estate franchises have traditionally offered practising agents a brand to operate under, some marketing support, training and awards and events to create a sense of community.
They’ve largely hoped to inspire engagement based on perceived merits in return for a fee and a percentage of sales with most offering their technology stack as an opt-in. It is the traditional real estate franchise model that will see the biggest shakeup over the coming years.
The experiences of Compass, eXP and Side in the US – and eView here in Australia – are signals of the radical rethink of the business model of real estate franchising. These real estate groups all enable their agents to do what they do best through new generation technology and services that are extremely customer-centric and have an emphasis on automation, data gathering and lead capture – and treating high performing agents like rockstars.
The US businesses are strong employers of data and marketing engineers, large tech teams and are funded to find solutions that make life easier for agents and the property experience frictionless for consumers. These investments are millions of times above and beyond what an independent principal in a suburban office could ever hope to cobble together with a string of SAAS subscriptions.
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