Our product roundups seem to get bigger every week. This edition sees no fewer than ten companies announcing product and service updates, from partnerships between portals and insolvency firms to two AI-related stories coming out of the UK.
We've split this roundup into global regions for your convenience, starting with...
Listings can now be categorized as 'coming soon' on Zillow's portal—as long as you're an agent-customer of Canadian real estate software company RESAAS.
RESAAS customers can opt-in to pre-market their clients' properties to build momentum and interest before officially going live.
Customers who pay for RESAAS’ Ultimate account level will have the option to push coming-soon listings to Zillow, but CEO Tom Rossiter has warned that this offer won't be for everyone:
"Coming Soon listings represent the most recent and sought-after listings in the real estate industry.
"Agents should still follow the Coming Soon guidelines of their local MLS. This won’t be for every agent, and isn’t for every market."
The Italian real estate portal Immobiliare has announced a partnership with abilio, a member of the Illimity Group and insolvency sales specialist. The deal will see abilio become the portal's exclusive concessionary for sales resulting from insolvency cases.
The two companies have worked together before to produce a report on the state of judicial sales in the Italian market.
Immobiliare's partnership announcement comes a month after agent-owned rival Wikicasa announced the launch of its Wikicasa Auction product: a digital, integrated service for the auction and NPE (Non-Performing Exposure) sector.
Spanish hybrid portal Housfy will now offer virtual staging thanks to a new collaboration with Barcelona-based StageInHome.
StageInHome is an interior decoration visualisation specialist that uses AI to let users 'dress' properties according to their preferences.
In a press release, StageInHome suggested that "by decorating properties in just 10 seconds, it manages to attract 62% more visits and, with it, significantly accelerate the sales process compared to the industry average."
Saúl García, CEO at StageInHome, said:
"This partnership with Housfy represents an important step forward in our mission to transform the way properties are decorated and sold.
"We are delighted to join forces and hope to offer innovative and effective solutions to our clients so we can grow together and make a difference in the real estate market."
Founded 2021, StageInHome is a part of the portfolio of startups promoted by Napptilus Tech Labs.
Russia-based real estate specialist DomCLick has added the option for users to book property viewings online, but it isn't nationwide yet.
Interested parties previously had to make phone calls or write to sellers to get the ball rolling on a deal.
Buyers can submit up to one application per listing, including picking a specific date and time.
Alexey Leipi, director at DomClick, said:
"We are the first real estate marketplace to launch online appointment booking. For now, it is available for secondhand properties in Moscow, St. Petersburg and the adjacent regions.
"In the near future, we plan to extend this service to the rest of the country."
AI-powered UK challenger portal Jitty has officially launched in Bristol, its second city on the road to a UK-wide index by the end of 2024.
Graham Paterson, CEO at Jitty, said:
"Bristol is a vibrant city full of beautiful homes. We love the West Country, and Jitty has been so well received in Bath that Bristol is an obvious next step for us. Aside from London, it's been our most requested next city so we're happy to oblige.
"The city's blend of historical and modern buildings makes for a fascinating cross-section of homes, and it's been a pleasure to look through the homes that our AI finds, to show homebuyers and browsers.
"This is just the start. We are listening to our users at every step of the way and will be sharing some exciting new features throughout 2024."
Jitty attracted 3000 users in Bath in two weeks after launch.
Jitty is an AI-powered property search engine that has been designed to transform the way people find and buy homes. The company was co-founded in 2023 by CEO Graham Paterson, formerly at Wise and Deliveroo, CPO James Storer, ex-Deliveroo, Freetrade, Habito, and Klarna, and CTO Daniel Cooper previously at Deliveroo, Duffel and Hopin.
UK challenger portal Propertynews has made what appears to be a UK-first AI assistant called "Liv", representing an investment of over a quarter of a million pounds to answer buyer questions 24/7.
Liv is based on the same technology that underpins ChatGPT and uses information from property brochures, and third-party data on topics including travel times and local amenities.
Emma Kerr, managing director at Propertynews, said:
"We believe this is the first AI assistant, used in this way, on a property portal anywhere. It is part of our commitment to being the number-one choice in Northern Ireland for buyers, renters and agents and to making the user experience as outstanding as it can be.
"A rigorous build and testing process has ensured that Liv offers best in class technology and seamlessly blends into the website to benefit and enhance the overall user experience."
Australian end-to-end transaction platform for pre- and off-market properties Listing Loop has launched a floorplan solution to its platform.
FloorPlan AI is set to offer the most cost-effective and fastest way to obtain a 2D interior floorplan, with a five-minute floorplan creation process turning around a completed floorplan within 24 hours.
FloorPlan AI produces accurate 2D floorplans with the property layout, room names, room dimensions, room fixtures and square meterage, all from using your phone’s camera to scan and by walking through each room. A fixed charge of $32 per floorplan.
Rhett Dallwitz, co-founder and CEO at Listing Loop, said:
"FloorPlan AI will significantly improve efficiencies by accelerating floorplan production and minimising the time involved in organising private inspections if the potential tenants can see the floorplan upfront. We are confident that FloorPlan AI will speed up the leasing process."
Listing Loop already allows users to find their ideal property, secure a home loan, receive expert buying guidance, arrange conveyancing, acquire specialised property financing, set up utilities and even organise removalists, cleaners and insurance from its platform.
Australian rental specialist Rent.com.au has s launched additional payment choices for its RentPay platform aimed at expatriate professionals, new migrants and foreign students.
The Company has partnered with Novatti Group Ltd to provide Alipay, WeChat Pay and UnionPay payment options for RentPay customers.
In a press release, Rent.com.au said this integration is "Expected to provide an incremental ARPU (Average Revenue Per User) contribution per transaction."
Greg Bader, CEO at Rent.com.au, said:
"RentPay is about providing choice and flexibility to renters while ensuring that property managers gain efficiency and certainty of payments.
"By being the first in our market to offer these popular new international payment options, we’re addressing a need that has arisen with increasing numbers of students, expats or recent migrants preferring to keep using these platforms due to the deep ecosystem, and the ties to family and friends they facilitate. At the same time, we’re helping our agent customers to position themselves at the forefront of payments technology without them having to invest valuable time and dollars in doing so.
"We have already seen several of our renters use immersive platforms platforms like Alipay and WeChat Pay to pay their rent in a roundabout way. With this release, RentPay now enables customers of these platforms to easily pay their biggest expense (rent) seamlessly and confidently."
Angola's leading real estate portal Angocasa has launched a new legal service for home purchases to ensure legally compliant transactions.
AngoCasa offers Basic, Standard, and Premium packages for clients with different needs and budgets. Each package includes essential services such as legal document analysis, preparation of purchase and sale contracts, and assistance throughout the property registration and legalization process.
Kenneth Hogrefe, CEO at AngoCasa, said:
"We are committed to providing our clients with safe and reliable solutions in the Angolan real estate market.
"With our new legal support service, we are taking another important step to ensure that property buying processes are transparent, legal, and hassle-free for all involved."
The Saudi Arabian real estate portal Wasalt has signed a partnership agreement with the 'rent now, pay later' specialist Rize.
Established in 2021 by Ibrahim Balilah and Mohammed AlFraihi (pictured), Rize aims to revolutionize the rental landscape in Saudi Arabia where rents have historically been paid for the year in a lump sum. The company aims to shift rental payments towards flexible monthly instalments, making it a standard practice in the real estate market. The startup recently raised a $2.9 million seed round.
The partnership, which is already live on the portal site, sees Rize's solutions integrated into Wasalt's rental listings to give users the option to pay rent monthly instead of yearly.
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