The onset of the pandemic has accelerated the demand for a transparent, online service when it comes to buying a home. During lengthy lockdowns, real estate agents in Australia have turned to platforms like AuctionNow (since rebranded to Realtair Sell) to ensure continuity.
As the country slowly eased out of its 2-year stretch of living under COVID restrictions, Realtair’s CEO, Peter Matthews, reflects on the importance of technology and its impact on the real estate industry.
“If agents aren’t prepared, then they will be replaced. Not by the technology, but they will be replaced by the agents that have transitioned into that digital space and become a genuine digital agent. From an agent’s perspective, you also get to understand exactly what properties you’ve got coming up, what your performance was like.”
By allowing agents to record bids through its software during a live auction, the Realtair platform provides a transparent selling process to both vendors and buyers for auctions or private treaty sales. Auctions can be run in-person and online at the same time through live streaming (what we call a “Hybrid Auction”). This broadens up the buyer pool for vendors whose properties are sold through Realtair. “We find that streaming the auction also means that any issue or anything that needed to be reviewed, you just go back to the video and check out exactly what happened,” says Peter.
The platform also takes the stress out of selling or buying a home for vendors and purchasers alike. This urgency is likewise fuelled by the global reach of the platform, vendors can sell their homes to purchasers anywhere in the world at any given day or time.
Ben Mitchell, Realtair’s Head of Strategic Sales and a top auctioneer, has first handily experienced the positive impact that the platform has had on the industry, “Gone are all those days of having to sit out the front and pencil a bid. For those buyers who couldn’t physically make it to the auction, there is now a platform for them to actually participate in the auction, whereas in the past, they probably said, no we’ll give it a miss.”
“We’re supposed to be giving our vendors and buyers the best advice on the day based on the information in front of us,” Ben adds. “So the ability to have that information and move the sale in whichever direction you think is best for the vendor or the buyer’s situation is key.”
Realtair has now also added built-in secure deposit taking into its platform, which allows agents to issue a request for deposit after the hammer drops on auction day.
Currently, 9,600 agents across all states are using the Realtair platform to transact their auction and private treaty listings.
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