Center for REALTOR® Development 107: Center for REALTOR® Development: Tech Meets Property: AI Trends in Real Estate with Dan Weisman: Part 2
We are in Part 2 of my conversation with Dan Weisman about AI in the real estate industry. Dan is a director of innovation strategy in the Strategic Business Innovation and Technology Group at the National Association of REALTORS®. In his role, he researches technology, strategizes what this tech may mean in the future, and builds relationships with tech leaders to better understand and drive innovation in the real estate space.
This episode is where we get practical, starting with using generative AI instead of Google for searches. How would that help you? What do you think about that? We'll discuss software that is genuinely helpful for you in your business. We wrap up with virtual reality. As cool as it is, why do we not see it used more often? Dan gives us his insights. Let's join him!
[1:24] I am so glad to have more time with Dan Weisman to learn more AI tips. In this episode, we are going to get into practical things! You may want to listen again later and get some of the apps if you're driving. We will link any apps we mention in the show notes. Look them up when you park.
[1:50] In the first episode, we discussed plug-ins and research to help us understand what's available.
[2:11] Dan Weisman is a Director of Innovation Strategy with the NAR. His team's focus is to look at and understand what technology is out there and help figure out how to drive innovation across the space to support membership in the industry.
[3:33] Dan says the tech can be overwhelming. He does this full-time, and it seems something new every day if not every hour. You've got to be careful about not always chasing the shiny object. Many projects are getting built on generative AI products like ChatGPT and Gemini.
[4:01] Dan's team is trying to focus on the pain points the NAR membership feels in their transactions and tie together the research and the relationships NAR is building with startups and big tech companies to help REALTORS® to be more efficient and productive.
[4:36] REALTORS® are talking to Dan about how many phone calls they receive and constantly being on call for their clients. Some cool products use AI to help schedule tasks and calendar meetings, almost like an AI assistant.
[5:44] Monica is ready for those products! She keeps busy keeping track of her schedule between her Google calendar, notebook calendar, and wall calendar.
[6:39] If you missed Part 1, generative AI is a tool that recently became more available to the public to generate information and content using artificial intelligence behind the scenes. Dan calls it Google search on steroids. Instead of multiple web pages, it gives you a relatively concise answer.
[7:11] You can plug information into it and ask for a response, and it will help formulate it in whatever way you want, with context and tone. It's for everyone.
[7:56] Since ChatGPT launched, people have been talking about tech. Dan loves it! He's been trying to talk about tech with agents for five years! It's an opportunity for everyone to use a different type of AI product and service to free up some time to help them be more efficient.
[9:17] Can Monica ask AI to orient her book in progress to another audience? Dan says yes, but it's a tool in its infancy. It will do a good job manipulating the information you put into it to satisfy your request. Its accuracy varies. Like any work you put out, pay attention to what it says.
[10:50] If Monica sees that you just copied and pasted your listing from ChatGPT, from the many long adjectives and how they sound, she does not trust it. Generative AI makes things up.
[11:50] When Dan gives presentations, he uses the example of providing the data for a listing to ChatGPT, and ChatGPT writes the listing description but gives it the wrong number of bathrooms. Luckily, Dan checked it. ChatGPT can do complex things and at the same time make silly mistakes.
[12:37] Always edit a listing for mistakes and personalize it as you want it to sound. It's obvious when the human touch is missing. That is critical in real estate.
[13:41] Monica uses AppSumo and Castmagic. Monica put a recording into Castmagic, which makes social media posts, transcripts, or show notes for a podcast.
[14:15] There are many apps to take information, edit it, and simplify it for various content platforms. It reminds Dan of CliffsNotes. Monica mentions Blinkist. Whatever ChatGPT pushes out, ensure it is accurate and has the context and tone it should have.
[16:17] Monica cites Otter, who takes notes in a meeting. When Monica sees the Otter notes from multiple people, she is overwhelmed by the quantity of information. Dan recommends focusing on your notes tool and tuning it to pull up the information you want.
[17:26] One of the powers of generative AI is learning about you and what you are looking for as you communicate with it more.
[18:34] When Dan gives a presentation about images, he'll take a photo of an iconic building, upload it to DALL-e by OpenAI, and ask it to remove the iconic thing. It usually takes 10 to 15 prompts to get it to do what he wants it to do.
[19:41] In Chicago, he takes a picture of the Bean and asks DALL-e to remove the Bean from the photo. It takes 10 or 12 tries. He doesn't show all the variations. The photo stuff has a long way to go. Dan took a listing to Canva and asked it to create a flyer. The images looked computer-generated.
[20:39] Dan says some real-estate-specific apps are doing a good job tweaking photos. Renovate AI and Reimagine Home are two big ones he's been looking at. You can take a photo of a room and request changes to it, and in seconds, you will get a couple of gen AI photo options as you requested.
[25:47] Monica points out that many agents are leaning toward virtual staging, and it is a pet peeve for buyers who want to see the actual condition of the house. That is a misrepresentation, a Code of Ethics violation. For any gen AI images in the listing, label them clearly as such, as different ways to view things.
[28:36] Agents must be responsible as an industry when it comes to utilizing these tools, to ensure that we don't dilute the value of what we're providing and the consumer's expectations when they show up to see a property.
[29:24] Monica recommends an agent derive from home or at least look at the pictures and see them before taking a client to them. The agent can confirm if that mountainous landscape in the background exists. Dan adds that agents need to be transparent about using gen AI tools.
[30:27] Monica asks about virtual reality and shares her experience of seeing a European condo in VR.
[31:24] Dan says VR is tough. You need at least a $500 headset. Many people feel uncomfortable or nauseous with the headset. VR headsets are being used in new construction and development, where there is a budget to build a VR experience. It is all custom, so it is expensive.
[32:22] With VR, since every house is different, there has not been an effective way to create an experience that would provide value for a reasonable cost. Augmented reality needs to come first. At some point, VR may become mainstream, but a price-efficient method to build it for a home is not yet available.
[33:15] Monica and Dan share their pain about communicating with bots. Bots will get better the more we use them. Dan has had success with the Amazon bot on a product return. The opportunity in the real estate space is for virtual assistant bots.
[35:44] Productive.AI summarizes your phone conversations locally without sharing them with the world. It will provide a list of the things you talked about to follow up. It is especially helpful if you are calling while driving.
[36:24] There are more agent and broker needs for virtual assistants than bots. The virtual assistants can help collect information and summarize it.
[37:20] Monica would like to see more agents providing FAQs or answering specific questions on their websites. Can a bot do that? Dan says that will come as generative AI matures.
[39:48] Monica is looking forward to having her own C-3PO generative AI bot to be all these apps for her.
[40:15] Dan's final word: When it comes to generative AI, I would tell everybody to try it. Do not try to jam technology into a problem that isn't a problem, and you make it a problem. Focus on what you do, how you run your business and how you communicate. Test generative AI to see if it can help you do your job better.
[40:55] Dan also says to be open-minded, be thoughtful, and use gen AI just occasionally. Before you know it, it will be integrated into your everyday life, making you more efficient and productive.
[41:18] Thanks again to Dan Weisman for joining us. I am so happy to hear a simple and helpful tech update. His focus on his work and on what he learns is what is important to us. He distills it down and makes it so easy.
[41:34] I am so fortunate to host this podcast and get to ask all these smart and focused people whatever questions I have. So let me know if you have some questions, you would like to hear us address on the podcast!
[41:46] I hope you're taking advantage of the great education being offered at Learning.REALTOR, especially the ABR® Class. We know that AI in every form is relevant to all parts of our business. If you do join classes in some live form, you'll get a better focus on what's up to date.
[42:12] Things are happening so fast. You will get those from the instructor or possibly from other learners in the classroom. I am also learning from you when I come to a classroom. We all need to keep learning from each other.
[42:24] So head over to Learning.REALTOR and see what is available there to match the needs of your business. If you have been listening for a bit, we would appreciate your feedback on this two-episode-per month format, as opposed to the one longer episode we used to do.
[42:43] Our email address is in the show notes. Please give us your feedback.
[42:48] Keep up the good work helping your clients do what they need and want to do in this shifting market. I'm Monica Neubauer for the Center for REALTOR® Development. Now go out there and sell some property!
Tweetables:
"Generative AI is a tool in its infancy. This is new. It will do a pretty good job of manipulating the information you put in to satisfy whatever request or requirements you have. … How accurate it is and how close it is to how you might want it always varies." — Dan Weisman
"One of the powers of generative AI is learning of you and what you are looking for as you communicate with it more." — Dan Weisman
"We have to be responsible as an industry when it comes to utilizing these tools." — Dan Weisman
Guest Links:
Dan Weisman, Director of Innovation Strategy at NAR
NAR Resource Links
ABR® Accredited Buyer's Representative
Additional Links:
Crdpodcast@nar.realtor
Learning.REALTOR — for NAR Online Education
CRD.REALTOR — List of all courses offered
Host Information:
Monica Neubauer
Speaker/Podcaster/REALTOR®
Monica@MonicaNeubauer.com
MonicaNeubauer.com
FranklinTNBlog.com
Monica's Facebook Page: Facebook.com/Monica.Neubauer
Instagram: Instagram.com/MonicaNeubauerSpeaks
Guest Bio
Dan Weisman is a Director of Innovation Strategy within the Strategic Business, Innovation, & Technology group at the National Association of REALTORS®. In his role, he researches technology, strategizes on what this tech may mean in the future, and builds relationships with tech leaders to understand better and drive innovation in the real estate space. He is in the thick of thought leadership.