Buying a home will never be the same: goodbye to visits and the show flat

A man searches for housing through electronic means SANTI BURGOS

Virtual visits to homes are common, video calls to the real estate agent have become common and the online signing of reservation or sale contracts has taken on a role that no one counted on.

At least so soon.

The pandemic has precipitated the digitization of the Spanish real estate sector.

“The tools already existed, the technological advances were there and making video calls was possible, but they were not made.

The pandemic has led to a change in habits and this has caused a rapid development of the digitization of the sector ”, points out Rubén Cózar, director of the Residential area of ​​Foro Consultores Inmobiliarios.

In fact, “the current situation is causing on-site visits to properties to be reduced.

Of course, they are more selective and productive.

That is to say, whoever comes is really interested, they are not going for a walk or gossiping, ”he adds.

Many of these face-to-face appointments are being replaced by video calls and 3D visits to the home, new or used, by a salesperson.

"Online open house days are common, in which you connect with customers in real time to clarify doubts, and also digital signatures of offers and contracts through your mobile to avoid unnecessary travel", says César Nozal, Vice President of the National Federation of Real Estate Agencies (FAI).

The race to win market and customers has begun.

Aliseda, a company of the American investment giant Blackstone and Banco Santander, says it has everything ready so that before the end of the year any client can purchase one of the 16,000 homes in its portfolio online (with the exception of the notarial signature).

"The covid has accelerated a process of digitizing the sale of real estate assets that was already in our strategy," says Fernando López, commercial director of Aliseda, which has partnered with Logalty, a digital transaction certification company, to contribute to the process the required legal security.

It is the first

that will offer all the phases of buying a house digitally: pre-booking, booking, sending the graphic information of the house (a real estate agent will take a tour of the house with his mobile) and legal documentation.

"If the client wants, he can continue in the digital circuit until the signature at the notary," explains López.

Although “the logical thing is that the buyer wants to visit the house at least once;

I see it very difficult that he does not do it, being the greatest investment of his life, "he adds.

Although there are exceptions.

During the state of alarm in Spain, from March to May, the Irish auction platform BidX1 sold properties for more than two million euros.

In no case did the buyers visit the houses and two of them formalized the purchase through the company's app.

"In the first two weeks of confinement, we sold two properties in the Community of Madrid for a value close to 200,000 euros and another two in the province of Barcelona for more than 800,000 euros," says Javier de Pablo, Property Director of BidX1 Spain.

Auction strength

The confinement and the prohibition of mobility were an accelerator for this firm, which is in its first year in Spain.

A time in which he has sold more than 200 properties (not just homes) for more than 34 million euros.

"It is a radical change over the auction model that existed in Spain, because now it is possible to buy a property with all the guarantees from anywhere in the world, from the mobile device and with all the necessary information in real time," he explains. From Pablo.

In fact, the first sale that BidX1 made when it landed in the Spanish market in 2019 was by a British citizen who lived in New York and bid with his phone for a property in Alicante.

It was a 330-meter chalet built on a 11,000-meter plot.

The price was 335,000 euros.

Before the covid, an increase with respect to the starting price of more than 10% was achieved.

Now it is below that 10%, indicates De Pablo.

Businesses that don't jump on the tech bandwagon aren't going to have much of a chance to survive right now.

"It will be a matter of time that we see more frequently the processes of buying and selling properties completely online", believes the vice president of FAI.

He sees it so clearly that he is betting because in the not too distant future, the algorithms of Amazon, Google and Facebook "will select for us the houses that fit our budget, lifestyle or preferred area," says Nozal.

In addition, the digitization of the sector does not require large investments.

“Not only will it not cost, but it will save money and time.

It favors planning, not to mention the difference in costs between a virtual show floor and a real one ”, emphasizes Cózar.

To the big promoters the change does not catch them with the changed foot.

The listed Aedas Homes is one of the most advanced in the digital process.

It reports that it has increased electronic signatures of contracts (reservations and sales) up to 400% per month since March, before the covid.

From a commercial point of view, its most powerful tool is Live Virtual Tours, which it launched last year and which allows the client to take a virtual tour of houses for sale, even if they are not built.

First, a 3D model of the promotions is created and visualized with a video game engine.

Then a commercial advisor who is on a virtual set is integrated into the 3D model and finally a live signal is broadcast.

The client connects through a video call, upon request for an appointment through the web.

The tool is active in more than a dozen promotions, especially in the Costa del Sol, the Balearic Islands and the Levante.

"We have already sold homes for an amount of about 15 million euros," they point out.

In Vía Célere, in addition to the virtual visits they have carried out since 2015, they have applied the digital signature and offer telephone advice and video calls.

"One of the positive consequences of the confinement has been the even greater reinforcement that has been made in the sector of digital channels in the purchase of housing", says José Ignacio Morales, CEO of Vía Célere.

"Clients can carry out the complete home buying process without visiting an office, with a 360-degree visit and signing their reservations, contracts and any other document," says Morales.

Even so, according to the studies of this promoter, the Spanish still prefer to carry out the process, or at least some part, in person.

"Human contact and face-to-face treatment continues to be an important factor that provides confidence and tranquility, something fundamental in a decision as relevant as buying a home," says Morales.

Something on which Rubén Cózar, from Foro, agrees: “They prefer to see, touch, analyze the area, the house, what is there”.

Matter of time.