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Artificial intelligence has long been a key part of the public’s imagination of the future; however, the past two years have made that future more tangible than ever, thanks to the rise of generative AI tools such as ChatGPT. The real estate industry has seized the opportunity at hand, with portals rolling out AI natural search experiences, tech companies creating smarter, more responsive transaction and customer management tools, and brokerages using AI to take daily, time-sucking tasks off their agents’ plates.
Gary Ashton
However, some agents still eschew artificial intelligence, or they’re stuck using the basic levels of tools like ChatGPT — two decisions Ashton Real Estate Group of RE/MAX Advantage founder Gary Ashton said will stunt agents’ and brokers’ growth.
“My analogy to the team is this: If I’m riding a horse and [buggy], and you’re riding a horse and [buggy], I’m probably going to get to the destination around about the same time [as you],” he told the Inman on Tour crowd. “But if you start adopting new technology, which would be the automobile, all of a sudden now you’re going 25 miles per hour, you’re way farther. And then by the end of [the trip], you’re two days ahead of me and I’m still click-clacking on the horse and buggy.”
“If you don’t adopt AI, you’re just clicking behind on the horse and buggy,” he added.
Ashton, The Agency Managing Partner and Principal Broker Scott Coggins, and Inside Real Estate CEO Joe Skousen called on brokerage leaders to take a more thoughtful approach to leveraging AI in their businesses.
Coggins said he often uses ChatGPT to take on marketing tasks such as writing listing descriptions or social media captions. He upgraded to a paid version of the platform and has learned to write more specific prompts to get better outputs.
“One of the things that we teach at our brokerage is how to generate and create the correct prompt to get the output that you need,” he said. “We take a basic listing description and run it through a prompt in ChatGPT, where it tells a story about the house. It invokes a feeling that makes a buyer want to come tour the property.”
Scott Coggins
“So, for example, you just tell ChatGPT, ‘Acting as a real estate marketing professional, take the following MLS listing description, rewrite it with the tone that you want someone to get excited about the property and schedule a showing,'” he added. “And within seconds, it spits out a beautiful description.”
Meanwhile, Skousen and Ashton have learned to use AI to unlock the power of their expansive client databases. Skousen said he’s learned to do “AI-driven keyword searches” to get more engagement from leads and contacts within his pipeline, and Ashton has used AI to transcribe notes from conversations with clients and automatically put those notes into his CRM.
“You can get three to five to 10 times the amount of conversations than you normally get. Literally tomorrow,” Skousen said. “You can get that kind of engagement from your database by turning on AI-driven searches.”
Joe Skousen
“Honestly, the AI is going to work,” he added. “The question is whether you’re going to do your part.”
All three brokers encouraged agents to “get going” with a variety of free AI tools, not just ChatGPT. However, they reminded the audience that the best results come from paid versions of platforms.
“Get your free version, try it out, and then you can move up,” Skousen said. “Kind of get your toe in it, and the more advanced you get, you’ll have some great products, but it doesn’t stop you from getting going.”
In another Inman on Tour panel, several tech experts took the conversation deeper by pushing attendees to deepen their understanding of AI and intentionally practice how to better use AI.
Mansour Bahramand
“You know, as agents and brokers, we have to spend a lot of our time figuring out how we can make our team more efficient,” Revive Real Estate CTO Mansoor Bahramand said. “For me, I’d be stopping and looking at my business as a way of like, maybe I need to focus on analyzing properties more. Maybe that’s where I’m spending two to four hours of my day every day trying to analyze properties.”
“Maybe most of my time is spent on communication and maybe I have to follow up with my current, upcoming clients,” he added. “Those are such good use cases to use AI that will automate your lives and make your lives a lot easier. Make [these platforms] like your best friend.”
Shilo co-founder and CEO Justin Benson, HouseWhisper.ai co-founder and CEO Luis Poggi and Brokerblocks.com co-founder and CEO A.D. Brar seconded Bahramand’s suggestion and said that brokers will get the best results from AI by deeply integrating it into their businesses instead of looking at it as a plaything.
A.D. Brar
“You’re already effective in the business process that you’ve established thus far. You can bring these tools in to expedite tasks, and make processes and your team more efficient, and scale while we’re having sort of consolidation in the industry,” Brar said.
“Using these types of tools can help everyone sort of level up,” he added. “There’s always opportunities to improve and streamline.”
Benson and Bahramand said AI is ultimately about helping real estate brokers scale more effectively than they would on their own, and reclaim their and their team’s time to do what they do best — serve clients.
“I just truly believe that if you’re not using AI, you’re going to fall behind,” Bahramand said. “And if more and more people are going to use AI, you’re going to start taking what you’ve currently got in your successful business and you’re going to start automating that.”
“If you’re not in the forefront of technology, know this stuff is coming,” he added. “You should be aware of it, and you should be adopting it. Because if you’re not, someone else is.”
