Real Estate Agents can never be replaced by technology because of the 3 fundamental functions technology cannot perform and they are as below.
Property Viewings
Attending a property inspection is often time consuming and most owners simply do not have time to do so. Their time can be wasted if the potential buyer is late or simply performs a no show. There may be pre-recorded virtual tour technology available attempting to be efficient but most potential buyers still want a physical viewing because details cannot be manipulated. This is one of the main reasons most sellers prefer to engage a real estate negotiator to handle the viewing process.
Negotiation
There are many instances where both buyer and seller do not want their identity to be revealed during the negotiation process. Either party does not want to appear more desperate than the other parties. Many sellers do not want their identity to be revealed during negotiation because a buyer can perform a background check putting them in a disadvantageous position. Many potential buyers also do not wish to reveal their identity in case the negotiation fails and their name gets misused as a bait for better offering from other potential buyers. Having a real estate negotiator in between helps in negotiation.
Flexible to solve problems
Every deal, especially secondary market properties have some kind of unique problems or requests by either the buyer or seller or local authorities or financial institutions or external factors. Only human intervention can structure the perfect solutions.
Technology is no threat to IT savvy real estate agents and at most to be treated as great tools to improve their productivity. For example
- Online articles to educate clients so real estate negotiators can save time explaining.
- Clients do their own research on property portals prior to contacting the real estate negotiator for efficiency because they already know what they want.
- Chatbots to help save time answering enquiries
- Social media for more online leads.
