Utilizing online technologies as a medium for commerce is a growing niche. Consumers are getting much smarter about using social media to help educate themselves on purchase decisions.
With a housing market here and nationally in the dumps, it’s only natural that both Real Estate agents and consumers looking to buy have begun to utilize the Internet to make a difference. I’ve purchased and sold a couple of homes in the past and realized early on that finding the right agent was the best decision we ever made! It saved my family thousands of dollars and made everything move with ease.
DoorFly is a marketplace where reputable real estate agents bid for a chance to work with home buyers. Customers meet successful registered real estate agents who assist in the home buying process and will offer them rebates.
Click through to this post if you don’t see the video on how DoorFly works!
You can read more about how this idea came to fruition at the DoorFly blog. The great thing about DoorFly is that it serves both the home buyer and the real estate agent. In this tough market, I’m sure that a medium that can connect the two are in high demand!
I got to meet with the DoorFly team over the last few months and they’re excited about the business and the opportunity to bridge this gap in the real estate industry! I’m looking forward to seeing their young startup take off!
Indianapolis seems to be a great startup market for Real Estate technology! Along with DoorFly, there’s also:
- URBaCS – URBaCS is a web-based photo application that homeowners use to share their building experience with friends and family members.
- Connective Mobile Real Estate SMS – An innovative lead generation tool that utilizes both text messaging and hosted toll free numbers to ensure that home information is always available to prospective buyers.
Each of the companies serve a different niche in Real Estate but all of them provide the market with unique solutions that help in driving home sales!
Just to be fair – I checked out Doorfly to see what they offer. Right now, in Indiana, they have 6 agents bidding on one buyer. The buyer wants to purchase a home for $40,000 and the highest bid is $500., which I asssume means the highest bidding agent is willing to rebate or give back $500. of their commission.
The problem I have with this, is the agent doesn’t know up front what his commission will be.
Disclosure: Commissions are not set and are always negotiable.
I have seen many bank-owned homes offering a set dollar amount of commission. In this case, let’s say they offer 3% or $1200.00. Maybe, they only offer $1000.00. In either case, the agent has given up almost half of their commission without even knowiing how many hours they will invest. I dont believe that is a wise investment of time or professional expertise.
I’ll guarantee a good buyers agent can negotiate a better deal for their client than $500. off the commission or even 50% of the commission on a $300,000. home. It’s not always about money – but the service and expertise one should expect.
Example – what f I negotiate 3% toward closing costs and a portion of that is used to buy down the interest rate by .5%. On this $40,000 home, I have saved my client $200.00 a year in interest alone.
There are too many examples of how to protect and promote your clients best interest in a real estate transaction to go into here, but thanks for allowing me my 2 cents. 🙂
Great feedback, Paula!
DoorFly is working directly off of word of mouth right now to get off the ground, the nice folks there have launched this while working full time – that’s pretty impressive but it will take a while to build up a lot of steam.
I’m a huge fan of hiring an agent, and like the competitiveness and choice this brings to the market. I don’t think DoorFly is marketing it all on the bid side – it’s about connecting the right agents to the right buyers for the right home.
I think that’s a great model. It provides consumers with choice and agents with a medium to connect to new buyers – something scarce these days!
Happy Holidays and thank-you for your input!
Doug,
Thanks for the link love. We’re excited about 2009 because we are finally seeing home builders step into the social media arena. Many builders are starting to blog, tweet and use sites like Facebook and Flickr. Although 2009 will most likely be sluggish in terms of new home sales we expect to see builders continue to reach out to new media.
Merry Christmas!
-Jayson