The Brief / Real Estate INTERVIEW
Explainer: Is proptech the future of real estate? As an in-demand asset class, proptech is opening up global markets for home buyers, as they no longer need to be in the market to make a purchase
The evolution of proptech offerings: The sector is moving incredibly fast, to deliver a range of services to customers. In the early days of proptech, most businesses focused only on classifieds and then on ibuyers. However, today we have moved from that to find platforms for mortgages; power buyers and in some cases full-service offerings. Customers desire a complete experience: In this age of convenience, customers who are serious about their purchase, want to move fast. Instead of wasting enormous amounts of time across every stage of their journey, they prefer having a single platform for everything. They want the full experience starting at the top of the funnel with search, to the bottom of the funnel where they close the transaction and receive financing. Customers want technology to enhance their experience: Finding and closing a home can be a time consuming and tedious process. With technology advances, home buyers seek an easy experience from discovery till they get their key in hand. For proptech companies, this is important as they must ensure that their technology is enabling an exceptional journey.
ILLUSTRATION: GETTY IMAGES/SORBETTO
Real estate purchases are no longer a local transaction: As an in-demand asset class, proptech is opening up global markets for home buyers. They no longer need to be in-market to make a purchase. In countries like the UAE, we are seeing growing demand from buyers in Russia and China, among other source markets. The fully digital experience enables trust with buyers who are seeking to build a global property portfolio.
For those entering the proptech space, what are the main challenges?
What are the key proptech trends you’ve seen this year? Real estate continues to be the world’s largest asset class, and very often, the single largest investment individuals make. Despite global economic uncertainty, the real estate sector grew by 59 per cent yearon-year in 2021. The maturing proptech sector is not only aiding this growth, but also bringing in a new generation of homeowners. Some of the key trends we see include: 16
November 2022
As a sector that’s going through change, newcomers could face a few challenges including: Slow pace of the industry: The sector hasn’t seen much change in the way things are done over the past few decades. Because real estate is low frequency and high value, with a lot of complexities, the sector doesn’t move as fast as other consumerfacing tech sectors. Lack of enabling technologies: With multiple legacy players and practices in the industry, there is no single solution that binds services together. This includes developers, real estate agents, banks and mortgage brokers. Without banking APIs, digital signatures, integrations with CRMs and more, gulfbusiness.com
