agent support ECOSYSTEM
Issue 75 - March 11th, 2022
Real estate agents are entrepreneurs who wear many hats. They are marketers, they are transaction coordinators, they are psychologists to their clients, they are neighborhood experts, they are advisors, they are consultants, they are magicians, they are texting and talking experts, and… I think you get the point.
Agents have a lot of moving parts to their profession on a daily basis, and they sometimes need help on various tasks to get their jobs done in an efficient manner.
The most common items that agents outsource to experts in some form or fashion are the following: marketing (agent websites, property websites, marketing flyers, social media posts), admin (transaction coordination services, offer drafting), and showing assistance with property showings (for the super busy agents).
A lot of brokerages claim to “provide these tools and services in-house”, but in reality the execution and service is pathetic when “provided by the brokerage firm”.
Agents will consistently go outside of their firm to hire vendors directly to help with website design or to help with transaction coordination services. A lot of brokerages attempt to build “self-service” software for the agents to create marketing items on their own. These tools are helpful and do the job in some instances, but a lot of agents do not love spending time learning new tools all the time.
In reality, most agents would rather just have someone help them execute on an item quickly and easily so they can stay focused on their strength which is selling/networking/consulting and advising their clients.
In my opinion, there is a hugely overlooked opportunity to “build things agents want” internally at a firm, but you just charge for the services at a reasonable or less than market rate cost. “Need a website created for a new listing? CLICK HERE” - instead of taking the agent through a website builder tool, they are contacted by a human who gathers the data and builds the website for them for a small fee.
This “service menu” could include all kinds of things agents need. The typical commission-split business model firms cannot economically “offer these services in house” OR they try to force agents to use half-baked software that doesn’t work in the first place.
There is a happy medium to technology and human support when it comes to dealing with agents, and I think this is a MASSIVE opportunity to change the way agents run their business in our world today.
Newsworthy Links To Share
Developer Backed by Olympic Ski Racer Bode Miller Looks To Bring Slopes to Texas (CoStar)
Why So Many People Became Real Estate Agents in the Pandemic (NY Times)
Growth Machines: Compass, eXp, and the Future of Brokerage (Mike DelPrete)
Coach K’s Last Game at Duke Spawned a $20 Million Real Estate Bubble: With a dozen students per tent, and hundreds of tents next to Cameron Indoor Stadium, the economy of Krzyzewskiville is so booming that even math majors like Rebecca Bell can’t wrap their minds around the numbers: The property inside this tent village would be appraised for about $20 million. (WSJ)
Goodbye Londongrad: Russian Oligarchs Put Pressure on U.K. Property Market: Over the past two decades, London’s high-end property market was overrun by the global superrich led by Russian oligarchs who did so many big, brash deals that locals called the city Londongrad. A mansion just a stone’s throw from Kensington Palace—on land leased from the crown—sold for $140 million to one oligarch, while estates built by Victorian aristocracy and industrialists traded to Russia’s new rich, who added sprawling subterranean pools and sleek glass walls. (WSJ)
The median apartment rent in Manhattan rose 28% Y/Y to a record $3,630/month in February. “Demand for apartments has been intense, even without a mass return to the office. The inventory of available apartments tumbled 81% Y/Y to just over 4,500, the fewest for the month of February since 2008. And the freebies landlords relied on to fill units while so many New Yorkers were fleeing the city are now rarer than they were before the pandemic hit.” (Bloomberg)
Meet the woman who builds the world’s most unique Airbnbs (The Hustle)