Keller Williams, the sprawling national real estate franchisor, plans to launch an instant offer service later this year, another indication of the future path of residential real estate transactions. The embrace of a technology-driven approach to buying and selling by the brokerage most keenly associated with real estate agents points more to the increasingly blurred lines between the two approaches than to an affirmation of one over the other.
“We’re looking to partner with highly-rated, trusted agents who we can pair with home buyers and sellers when it is the customer’s best option,” the company said. “To start, when someone requests an offer on their home from Opendoor but it’s outside of our buy criteria, our brokerage will refer them to one of our Agent Partners.
For the upstart iBuyers, the goal is a lot more focused, for now. Agents may play a role, but “the vision is to make it simple and instant to buy and sell your home,” said Dod Frasier, Opendoor’s vice president of capital markets. “When you look at the process today, it’s filled with uncertainty and pain points, and all these different people who have to get coordinated. We make it a few simple clicks. Our goal is to give you a fair value for your home.
Even if the lines of demarcation between the pure-play iBuyers and companies that once mostly catered to real estate agents are becoming increasingly hazy, one small startup has its own niche – although it, too, hearkens back to an old, unsexy real estate work-around. Knock is the online disruptor version of a bridge loan for people who are ready to move up, but need to rely on the equity in an existing home for a down payment.
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