Author Stefan Swanepoel began writing a series of Trends Reports in 2006. His 2019 report does not disappoint. The report chronicles the top 10 trends that he recognizes as material topics for our industry to think about. Swanepoel believes that this year will be “the single largest industry transformation in living memory.”
Realogy Franchise Group brought together 300 industry leaders to hear and vote on their 6th Annual Realogy FWD Innovation Award. Sherry Chris of Better Homes and Gardens Real Estate is the brand sponsor of the event but it was really a team effort that fostered collaboration among all of their brands. Chairman Ryan Schneider kicked off the event with opening remarks that focused Realogy’s strategy for the event suggesting that Realogy always balances the decision of “Build, Buy, or Partner” in all of their technology decisions. He noted that for Realogy, it is “our opportunity to leverage technology,” remembering that real estate is a human focused business enhanced by technology.” Well said.
I have been reading articles about Zillow Group’s positioning on Upstream and the forms licensing policy of the California Association of REALTORS® with great interest. My take away is that Zillow Group is doing and saying exactly what they should be doing and saying to positively impact Zillow’s market opportunities in real estate. Remember, Zillow has industry relations people and government relations people that want to fight tooth and nail for every advantage they can get. It’s business.
Congratulations to our friends at eXp REALTY for achieving yet another important milestone. In addition to doubling the size of their agent count in less than 1 year, they have been able to do it while keeping their employees very happy - not an easy thing to do! What’s the their secret? Here’s the secret sauce from where I sit. 1. Unique business model that focuses the money where it should be - in the hands of those creating value for the company - the agents 2. Consistent training and coaching because of centralized management support 3. Passion - [...]
At WAV Group, we like to look under the hood at what the top property search sites in America are doing to engage consumers and boost performance. In some cases, we work with the site owner and have access to their analytics (ie Google Analytics or other). In other cases, we use benchmarking tools like Hitwise and ComScore to get a glimpse into what these top performers may be doing. The results are interesting.
Imagine a world where every real estate agent, broker and franchise in the nation promoted their real estate mobile app to consumers. The app is white-label branded to the agent, broker, and franchise offering direct access to every MLS listing without any competitive ads. That is the way it would need to work. Guess what, we have it. You have it. Our industry has it. Today.
Since its early days, Zillow Group has maintained a position that the consumer interest is best served by allowing listings from all sources, including For Sale By Owner, to be posted to their site. This may be, in part, why Zillow sites had up to 187 Million unique users visit their sites last year. Recently, WAV Group has noticed a new type of broker support that is in line with this policy.
It seems like every week we’re hearing about a new announcement from a large brokerage or franchise telling us they are spending millions on technology and re-positioning their brand story around their technology suite.
If you know anything about Hunt Real Estate Corporation, you know that they are a family owned and operated brokerage with high integrity and a fierce approach to competition. Since 1911 they have been a market leader in upstate New York, cities like Buffalo, Niagara Falls, Rochester, Syracuse, Albany, and the many Southern Tier communities that border Pennsylvania. They recently expanded into the Boston marketplace though a significant acquisition. We have known the Hunt family since Marlyn and I lived in Orchard Park, NY. We became friends though our interactions at The Buffalo Club and The Country Club of Buffalo. At the time, Marilyn ran marketing at Fisher-Price and I was spinning up my first start-up companies.
The smartest technology companies and most progressive MLSs are leading our industry to a new era of efficiency and profitability. They are making it easy for start-ups to expand quickly from market to market and serve the innovation needs of brokers. These leaders are supporting well-established companies to evolve their data platforms and opening the door for standardization in EVERY market in the country.
In talking with various people inside brokerages, I hear the same challenge time and time again. "My data is all over the place and I have no way to figure out what it means." Driving information out of your data is Business Intelligence (BI). There are free or low-cost solutions to help analyze data in your control and derive the answers needed to make better business decisions.
This Flashback Features series unearths profiles from the past of real estate and technology leaders. A version of this story was first published in California Real Estate magazine. This profile of Craigslist founder Craig Newmark is from 2006. By Kevin Hawkins Craig Newmark, the Internet’s reluctant mogul, makes his daily visit to Café Reverie in the Cole Valley neighborhood of San Francisco. He has dog biscuits in his pockets and a ready smile for the next little child that he encounters.
