In our rapidly changing digital world, it has traditionally taken a little time before new technologies were widely adopted by an industry, its professionals, and its audience. This was the case for email in the late 1990s (can you remember how long some of your clients held out for home phone calls and snail mail?) and more recently the case for social media and mobile devices. But in an industry as competitive as commercial real estate, it truly is the proverbial early bird that catches the worm.
As leaders in the Asheville-area commercial real estate market, NAI Beverly-Hanks is continuously looking toward the future. Which new social media platforms and features will make property searches easier? What’s the best way to communicate the potential of a property to interested parties both nearby and at a distance. What technologies would make us look really cool?
In our discussions, we’ve come back to two major frontiers: virtual reality and cloud-based technologies. As NAI Global mentions in a recent blog post, the cloud lets CRE professionals create an office anywhere and share resources instantaneously with anyone.
Thanks to the cloud, real estate is becoming a digital service.
As the tech applications for CRE become ever more responsive to the needs of brokers, investors, and developers, they’re also becoming more compatible with other systems. The cloud creates the capability to integrate these applications and create a powerful system for managing business that’s unlike anything the industry has used in the past. It’s disrupting the industry in the best sense, and changing how business plans are modeled.
The cloud is already here, disrupting decades-old practices and bringing agents forward to better meet the needs of their clients. But is its ubiquity its downfall? Does being too accessible and too transparent prevent some agents from making the switch? If so, that’s certainly not a complaint you can make about virtual reality. VR has been an eye-catching technology in movies for decades, until recently just part of a dream of the future more than a technology grounded in reality (no pun intended). Now that VR devices are on the market at an accessible price, the appeal of VR hasn’t diminished much, if at all.
According to the News Funnel:
Particularly in large markets, VR can eliminate wasted time spent travelling (sic) between multiple properties that turn out to be unsuitable. Clients can come into the office and virtually tour multiple properties, narrowing down the list to select finalists. With traffic in metropolitan areas, it can easily take a couple of days to physically tour several prospective locations.
Even international buyers benefit from access to VR technology. Buyers from Asia and Europe can check out properties thoroughly before taking time to fly in and finalize the deal. Sellers benefit because the buyers that make contact are better informed and are serious about making an offer.
It’s clear that as the use of these technologies continues to grow in primary markets, competitive agents and agencies will be required to get on board. NAI Beverly-Hanks is poised to move in the best interest of our agents and clients. Which technologies do you think will be the next frontier for commercial real estate?