Many real estate practitioners are wondering what the industry will be like in the near future. Although no one has a crystal ball to the future, several trends do suggest some predictable outcomes. On-line home shopping is here to stay The trend of buyers taking charge of their own transactions will be impossible to reverse. Traffic numbers on Internet home search and loan sites indicate that buyers are enjoying the on-line experience too much. Consumers can go on-line, obtain the information they want anonymously, and then act in their own time.
Consumers can literally find everything thing they want on-line, including tours of homes.
Currently, consumers outpace Realtors in the adoption of technology. This means they can access and act on information more quickly than they can with the services of the average Realtor. Realtors who are able to reverse that trend and provide services and information faster than the consumer can, will survive. Technology has raised the bar for Realtors Realtors must first and foremost realize that they are no longer the first point of contact for the consumer, and that their value to the real estate transaction is diminishing in the eyes of the consumer. Consumers will have no tolerance for agents who can't perform functions faster, more efficiently and more accurately than they can for themselves.