— By Graham Hill

In business there is an age-old tension between wanting to find the next new thing versus doing what has always worked. In today’s real estate market, one way to refer to “the next new thing” is to talk about proptech, or various new ideas about technology in real estate.

While real estate companies might want technology and software to help manage their businesses, buyers and sellers often want straightforward advice and guidance – from somebody. Beyond technology, does proptech offer value to buyers and sellers and the human side of real estate?

Proptech Business Models That Create Human Relationships

One very human aspect of real estate transactions is the relationship between the seller and the real estate agent.

Traditionally, it has been the agents that guide clients through the process of buying and selling property. There are several proptech companies that have created tools to help clients choose those real estate agents. Services like real estate agent comparison websites show how proptech companies are making technology work to enable the human side of real estate.

Real Estate Agent Comparison Websites

For example, take Netanagent.com. They are a proptech startup located in England. Their promise to customers is to be “the hassle-free way to bring property owners and agents together.” While some of the business models in the proptech space can be a little opaque, connecting a home seller with an agent is a value proposition we can all understand.

“Compare estate agents. Review the instant proposals, and compare estate agent fees and services. Then, ‘request a valuation’ from any of the agents. No negotiation, no hassle.”

— Netanagent.com

In the description above, the premise becomes a little more specific: they provide a list of available agents along with data about those agents’ fees. That is one practical way in which proptech uses technology to create relationships.

Finding Agents with Lower Fees and Commissions

Companies like Netanagent.com collect information on the fees charged, the services offered, and other data. The seller provides the location of the property where they want do business, and these services return a list of details from local real estate companies. Netanagent.com, in particular, provides details from the agents about the fees charged and the listing services used by the agent.

There is a lot of information. And it is free.

“Research shows that an agent’s fee is the deciding factor for most property owners when choosing an estate agent.”

— Netanagent.com

Netanagent.com does not provide a referral; there is no specific introduction. Instead, they provide a list of agents that can service the seller’s property, based primarily on location and data about the agents’ fees; that is an area where technology can help.

These services take details about real estate companies and put that data into a format that allows clients to easily compare offerings and initiate a relationship. Data that might be available elsewhere online or after a few phone calls is aggregated to one place, offered quickly, updated regularly, and made much easier to use.

Netanagent.com can bring you closer to choosing a real estate agent, but they do not profess to offer a “personal” service. They provide data, and you do the choosing. And they do not actually rank agents; they rank agencies, showing you information from a given real estate company, rather than details about specific real estate agents or brokers.

As we reviewed the Netanagent.com example some questions came to mind: Other than agents’ fees, what criteria do sellers use when they choose a real estate agent? If an agent has a somewhat lower fee, is that all you need to know to want to do business with them?

Comparing the Performance Data of Real Estate Agents

There are other proptech companies that help you “find the best agent to sell or let your property,” based on actual performance data. Rentround is an example of a company that wants to help compare real estate agents, but provides a different approach.

“What we show you: Cheapest agents, fastest to let, best valuers.”

— Rentround.com

Once again, we have a technology company using data to help sellers and owners feel more confident in the process of “how to choose an estate agent.” Netanagent.com focuses on fees, Rentround focuses on the agents’ history of sales performance – two different approaches to help a client feel more secure in their search to hire a local real estate agent.

The proptech marketplace offers a lot of options at the level of fees and performance data. More data is often a very good thing and these real estate agent referral services give clients more information and more choices.

If you are looking to quickly arrange for several proposals from real estate companies in your area, these kinds of services can be a great solution. If you are looking for an “agent you can trust,” that is a different process.

Online Reviews of Real Estate Agents

But what about property sellers that aren’t “data focused?” What about clients that do want help finding a real estate agent, but their challenge is that they don’t know who to trust?

Part of the problem with the internet is that it often provides us with too many choices. What if it is not more data that you need, but a specific recommendation? These questions are particularly relevant when proptech companies direct sellers to real estate companies, but not to the reputation of an individual agent that will be in relationship with the seller.

There are several online services with reviews of actual estate agents. Testimonials from clients in Google’s Business Profiles can often provide individual reviews of specific real estate agents.

Online reviews of real estate agents on Google help consumers make a more informed decision; in that way they have something in common with Netanagent.com and Rentround. All these companies provide information on real estate agents. While some companies take the path of data, reviews provide a more qualitative way to make a choice. The preferred way to choose an agent varies across clients; sometimes it is data, sometimes it is something more personal.

Choosing a Real Estate Agent Based on Professionalism

Getting at the human side of real estate, there is a lot of traditional knowledge about how and why buyers and sellers choose an agent. A quick search on the internet will show you that sellers often make decisions based on the agent’s professionalism, how well an agent communicates in person, how fast they return phone calls, and other factors.

These human-centered criteria are also sensible, and have traditionally been a part of real estate relationships.

Real Estate Agent Recommendations

For many buyers and sellers, their relationship with an agent begins after a recommendation from a neighbor, friend, or family member that knows the agent, or has done business with that agent before. A personal referral may not even be an objectively better way to find a real estate agent, but that personal connection (knowing that agent via a friend or family) is a preferred path for some clients.

Clients that want more than aggregated statistics and online reviews may choose to do things the old-fashioned way; they can ask for a referral from people they know. Some percentage of real estate clients won’t want more data and details. They want guidance about a specific agent to work with as they navigate a property transaction.

Real Estate Agent Referral Companies

While the real estate agent comparison services featured above focus on the estate company and performance data, internationally there are several companies that offer agent-specific data, or personalized introductions to real estate agents.

Several services are focused on the reputations of specific real estate agents. Homelight.com in the US offers home sales data for individual real agent agents. A company called Which Real Estate Agent in Australia also provides recommendations that focus on individual agents’ criteria. And Propertyguru in Singapore provides details on specific realtors.

We talked to another real estate referral company that has intentionally taken the path of less technology. Find Hokkaido Agents is a real estate company that helps clients buy property in Sapporo that provides person-to-person introductions to real estate agents.

“For our clients, our main offering is personalized real estate agent recommendations. For a certain kind of client, we know that kind of introduction helps create trust.”

— FindHokkaidoAgents.com

Whether the rankings or recommendations are based on quantitative data, qualitative reviews, or a personal touch, there is a wide range of offerings to help you choose a real estate agent.

The internet has certainly delivered on its promise to give us endless data and options at a moment’s notice. Sometimes that is what we want. Other times, having someone that can cut through that information and help us feel comfortable is what would really make us feel better about a decision. That is true when choosing which property we buy, and also true when choosing an agent to help us with that purchase.

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