Marilyn Wilson Lund, my wife and business partner, spends much of her time talking with consumers about how they search for homes. WAV Group Research is best known for agent satisfaction studies, but they also conduct consumer research for many of the largest property search portals in America.
Here’s the difference: internal research teams at portals tend to see the world through their own product lens that is zoomed in a little too closely. Outside firms without real estate experience don’t know the right questions to ask or how to dig in with follow up questions that inform better product decisions. WAV Group lives in the middle ground, close enough to understand how real estate works but objective enough to see how consumers actually behave.
The Manvel moment
This week, Marilyn was testing property search tools with consumers in Manvel, Texas. This morning, I opened my email and found a saved search from Redfin for, you guessed it, Manvel. I hadn’t searched for it. Redfin had quietly connected the dots: my IP address, my household, and my wife’s session. (Good thing my wife is not planning to secretly move out).
It’s not the first time this has happened. I’ve walked through open houses and then, within hours, received saved searches from Zillow or another portal. I spend a lot of time searching in NYC, Western New York, St. Petersburg, and Arroyo Grande. Somewhere in the background, these companies are linking behaviors across devices, addresses, and people, turning casual curiosity into measurable intent. Out of the blue I get property emails because they think that I am shopping and not researching.
The quiet power of consumer data
That’s the brilliance of today’s consumer portals. They’re not just hosting listings. They’re mapping the invisible web of relationships between search activity, open house visits, and household connections. Every data point feeds a feedback loop designed to increase engagement and generate leads.
Meanwhile, most brokerages are still treating their CRMs as static databases. If a past client starts touring homes again, the agent doesn’t know until it’s too late. Portals, on the other hand, know within hours.
What if brokers had the same visibility?
The technology exists today. Brokerages could license behavioral tracking and trigger-based marketing platforms that flag when a past client is browsing listings, scheduling tours, or requesting valuations. The difference is mindset. Portals view consumer data as a living signal system. Brokers often view it as a filing cabinet.
The question is whether the industry is comfortable with this level of insight. There’s a line between proactive service and digital surveillance. Consumers don’t always realize that when one family member searches online, another might be automatically enrolled in a drip campaign. It’s clever, and a little creepy.
The path forward
If brokerages want to compete, they’ll need to embrace the same behavioral intelligence that powers the portals but with stronger privacy commitments. Imagine a CRM that doesn’t just store names and numbers, but actively surfaces when those relationships start showing intent again.
Portals have already built that future. Brokers can too, if they’re willing to rethink what “relationship management” really means in a data-driven world.
If you are a brokerage who is looking to deploy this technology, reach out below. Let’s work on your strategy together.
