Are real estate agents becoming obsolete? Asked and answered.

For residential real estate brokerages, the beginning of a new year can bring many changes.  It's agent recruiting season.  There are several big conferences.  Everybody (including me) wants to weigh in on how the industry will change in the coming year and future.  

This year, the r.e. industry talk has all been tech, tech, and more tech, such as:  Artificial intelligence will make agents obsolete.  Agents need more tech tools.  For brokerages, "my tech is bigger than your tech" is the new rallying cry.  Even the head of Keller Williams has stated, "We are no longer a real estate company.  We are a tech company."  What does this mean, and how will it impact home buyers and sellers?  Regardless of what you hear, I believe tech will have little impact, that it hasn't already had (Docusign, Zillow, Redfin), on residential real estate.

This is coming from an agent who loves technology.  I had a website in 1998, before most people even knew what a website was.  I've had this blog going since 2008, for pete's sake.  Docusign enabled me to start my own brokerage.  My social media footprint is strong, and I've tried (and paid for) lots of shiny new stuff along the way.

So, if I love tech so much, why am I flying in the face of industry "experts"? Because agents in wear at least two hats.  Sure, you can find a home online.  If you're a seller, you can create video walk-throughs and hope nobody pesters you to actually see the house.  But the second part of any real estate transaction is negotiating, shepherding, and managing the sale.  It is an even bigger part of a transaction than the initial find/buy, and it takes a client-centered, individual touch that no tech can provide.  As an example, here is a post from the online blog Quora:

Are real estate agents becoming obsolete?

Sean Hess, Managing Partner, Broker, St. Augustine Team Realty

I am a Realtor and a Broker, and if you could just jump online and buy a house you wouldn’t need me. Actually, there are auction sites where you can buy a house online, so you really don’t need me.

But I will always have a job, and I chalk it up to human nature.

Buying a house should be easy. You should be able to go out and find a house you like, and then buy it. But there’s so much drama.

Here’s some of the issues I’ve seen pop up over the years:

A buyer wanted to buy a house near the beach, and yet seemed astounded when I advised her that she needed flood insurance.

I had a seller tell my customers as that some river rocks around the house made it “termite proof.” I had to convice these customers that there is no such thing as “termite proof” in Florida.

The first thing almost every buyer asks when they sign a purchase agreement for a home is, “How do I get my money back if…” (the question is always open ended). In other words, they’re already thinking of backing out before they’ve even made the offer. 

In a sale where I had the buyers, the sellers claimed on a written disclosure that the home never had termites, yet proudly presented receipts for work done to repair “extensive termite damage.”

I’ve had the sellers in a transaction swear a home was termite free. After termites were discovered and a pest service came out to fumigate, the neighbor strolled over and said, “Well, they’re finally doing something about those termites.”

After a lender told me three days before closing that the buyer’s paperwork was good and we would close on time, the lender literally disappeared. I had the sellers and it was a very rough month until we could close again with another lender.

I once had a couple lose a house because they put off some required paperwork in order to go play bingo.

At a home inspection one of my partners attended, he opened the door to find a man with a gun drawn. The seller didn’t bother inform the tenant (with the gun) that people were coming over that morning. The tenant thought someone was breaking in.

Is a pattern emerging here?

So why do you need a Realtor? 

You would think it’s the marketing, the access to all of the homes, knowledge of certain neighborhoods, the understanding of contracts, or all the background expertise about inspections. But it’s not.

Because in every real estate transaction at least one of the parties visits Crazyland somewhere along the way. And that’s normal.

The Realtor’s core value, the sole reason we exist, is to keep the other side honest and to massage away problems when they happen.

A real estate sale is probably the highest dollar transaction a regular person will ever be involved it. It creates a huge amount of stress.

Because of this stress I often see people at their very worst.
Something goes wrong and they get so upset with the other party that they are willing to cut off their own nose to spite their face.

They break promises and lie because they think telling the truth will cost them money. Usually it ends up costing them money anyway and it always takes a Realtor to iron things out. With grace and with tact.

So even though I’m the business of selling a staple product (food and clothing being the other two), I actually owe my job to human nature.

Honestly, I would rather deal with sane people. But when one of my agents comes in with a transaction blowing up I tell them, "That's our job, that's the reason they need us. Let's go save somebody's world again..."

Sunday morning reading

There are two interesting articles in the newspapers today:  First, from the NY Times, the esteemed Robert Shiller says that we're NOT in another housing bubble, and the future of housing still has many clouds.  He does agree that the market is improving, however.

And Alejandro Lazo of the L.A. Times has a feature on the Calculated Risk blog.  Please note that CR is in this blogroll, and this blog is on CR's blogroll.  Yes, the blog is a little wonky, but for those of you that like stats, you might want to check it out.

LALand is defunct

My favorite real estate blog, The L.A. Times' real estate blog, LaLand, is no more. It is moving in with Money & Co., the Times' economic blog. I'm sorry to see it go, but I guess we all should have suspected this would happen -- everybody knows LAT is cutting itself down to the bone.

Peter Viles was the original editor of the blog, then Peter Hong, then Lauren Beale. They all had really good grasps on our local market and its various permutations. Yes, LALand's posters were infuriating more often than not, and I was occasionally a poster target for my perceived pro-real-estate market, anti-bubble posts. But it was stimulating, to say the least.

At least we still have L.A. Curbed.

Why I will no longer allow anonymous posts here

The LA Times’ James Rainey wrote a great “On the Media” column today. It’s entitled Website Comment Boards Bring Out the Inner Vulgarian. Boy, I’ll say.

I’m a frequent poster on the LA Times’s LaLand real estate blog. The blog examines the local r.e. market. Peter Viles, the blog editor, rode along with me on our local caravan back in February. Most of the posters there believe the real estate market is in the middle of a prolonged crash, and it can get a little shrill and flame-y. I admit I have contributed to the flames in the past. Lately, however, the comments have been getting very more and more childish and vindictive. For example, from yesterday: “Real estate agent…when you’re too ugly to work at Nordstroms.”

And here, a poster named Anon has continually challenged me on statistics (see my Stalker post, below), ignored my boots-on-the-ground posts on my local market experiences, and has sent in some increasingly viscious comments. Anon, if you don't like my blog, don't read it. If you want a forum, create your own blog.

I have loved the freewheeling nature of blogging and open commenting in major media outlets. But, Rainey is right. The tone of the comments everywhere is descending and beginning to seem like recess on the third-grade playground.

And, this blog is not a democracy. I started it to try to give information about my local market, promote my services and (hopefully) amuse you readers with various real estate absurdities. So, I’m not only going to moderate posts, I will no longer allow anonymous comments of any kind. As Rainey’s article says,

“Webmasters could begin to fix the problem and heighten the level of discussion by requiring folks who want to share their views to also agree to publication of their real names. If you're not willing to put your name beside that lovely screed, maybe it really isn't fully fit for human consumption.”