Joseph Sirosh, the Chief Technology Officer of Compass Real Estate brokers, says AI can save realtors a lot of footwork in listing homes. (Source: CNBC.com)

Real Estate AI Simplifies Data Gathering for Realtors, Loan Agents & Buyers

Depending on where you live, the latest housing sales uptick has been nothing short of remarkable. Now it turns out that a lot of that growth in sales can be attributed to the enthusiastic use of AI by real estate agents. Yes, AI.

Diane Olick’s story on cnbc.com shows how AI has revolutionized the speed of housing sales. Algorithms can now go through millions of documents in seconds, looking through property values, debt levels, home renovations, and even some of a homeowner’s personal information.

“The traditional agent would go knock on the doors of a lot of homes. Now AI helps you find the homes that are most likely to sell in the next 12 months,” said Compass’ chief technology officer.

Seeflection.com  featured an article last year that announced that agents were beginning to show interest in using AI. The computations and information gathering that would take agents weeks or months to develop now can be done in seconds. House size, rooms, outside features, for instance, can all be reviewed, tabulated and made ready for buyer review in short order.

Some of the biggest names in the business, such as Compass, Zillow, and LoanSnap, are now employing AI to help find buyers the perfect mortgage and the perfect home. For real estate agents, it may already be a game-changer.

At LoanSnap, a San Francisco-based mortgage lender, AI is used in various steps of the mortgage process, from finding the perfect loan type for a borrower to finding the right investor for the loan.

Zillow Widgets is one example of the apps used to review existing homes and predict values and sale potential.

First, the borrower’s financial information is put in. Then the system uses the information, forecasts into the future, “and looks at thousands and thousands and thousands of options,” said Karl Jacob, CEO of LoanSnap. “That’s different ways of paying off debt, different loan options, and this is one of the first times AI has been turned into something that helps consumers versus harms consumers.”

For refinances, he said, “We’re building a financial model for someone, and showing them exactly how much money they’re losing on a monthly and yearly basis, and then showing them how they could potentially fix that issue and save money in the future. Again, in seconds.”

So everything about real estate is made for AI. From the financial details to probabilities of sales and profits. All of it is being answered in seconds with the algorithms that the biggest companies are employing.

Zillow now has updated its Zestimate.

“In the case of the Zestimate algorithm, the neural network model correlates home facts, location, housing market trends and home values. As a result of this update, the Zestimate can now react more quickly to dynamic market conditions, providing homeowners with a more accurate estimate [prediction] of a home’s current value,” according to a Zillow release.

read more at cnbc.com