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Launch HN: Modern Realty (YC S24) – AI Real Estate Agent for Home Buyers

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Re: Launch HN: Modern Realty (YC S24) – AI Real Estate Agent for Home Buyers

#91

Post by sahmeepee »

Raffi_Isanians wrote: post #36
eagleinparadise wrote: post #29

Best of luck. I’m a commercial real estate professional who has spent time as a broker, lender, and private equity investor. Residential definitely is a lot More of a ridiculous market. But ultimately as an agent, you get hired to work with mostly irrational actors (sellers and buyers). As someone who is very interested in AI and taught myself how to code (I don’t know any other real estate people who know anything a…

Appreciate the support. We aren't necessarily trying to uproot the industry, just want to deliver a better buying experience. People deserve agents who go out and do a lot of the work for them. Our goal is to do everything we think a real estate agent should do. Lots of value to be provided.

Aaah, but can it show you into a room with a toilet, sink, shower and bath in it and tell you "This is the bathroom"?

If not, you'll never unseat the seasoned professionals of the UK real estate sector ;)

Re: Launch HN: Modern Realty (YC S24) – AI Real Estate Agent for Home Buyers

#92

Post by whiplash451 »

keeptrying wrote: post #46
eagleinparadise wrote: post #29

Best of luck. I’m a commercial real estate professional who has spent time as a broker, lender, and private equity investor. Residential definitely is a lot More of a ridiculous market. But ultimately as an agent, you get hired to work with mostly irrational actors (sellers and buyers). As someone who is very interested in AI and taught myself how to code (I don’t know any other real estate people who know anything a…

The ludicrous 6% fee is whats going to drive adoption by end users and in turn by brokers. Move that fee to 1% for buyer agent and you have a massive market.

If there was a serious opportunity to arbitrage under the 6% fee, you bet that someone would have done it already — and well before the AI era.

Re: Launch HN: Modern Realty (YC S24) – AI Real Estate Agent for Home Buyers

#93

Post by greenfish6 »

eldavido wrote: post #84

I tried to automate a big chunk of property management (mostly commercial) over the past few years. The main thing I realized is that it's mostly a people business, and AI (or computers generally) are never going to stand over a vendor's shoulder and keep them honest (e.g. make sure they sweep up or don't scuff the walls), or have a difficult conversation about late rent with a tenant, or show up after hours when a p…

I think people are constantly changing their comfort zones when they fall in love with different products.

People definitely would be open to real estate w/ software. Otherwise, by this logic, why do people use Zillow? Why don't they just drive to their local Relator office to ask about local listings? How could you trust an online algorithm to show homes instead of someone describing homes to your face?

We are seeing that the fraction of home buyers that sign with the first buyer the meet is declining - more opportunity for us!

Re: Launch HN: Modern Realty (YC S24) – AI Real Estate Agent for Home Buyers

#94

Post by rootusrootus »

I am skeptical but optimistic. At the very least, this introduces another avenue to let competition drive down realtor pricing. I would like to see a realignment of incentives. Getting a cut of the sale price is just good for the agents' bottom line, but not good for the buyer or seller.

The problem is the monopoly realtors have. Regulate it better, or break it up, and the market can definitely handle the rest.

Re: Launch HN: Modern Realty (YC S24) – AI Real Estate Agent for Home Buyers

#95

Post by thinkmorebetter »

greenfish6 wrote: post #72
thinkmorebetter wrote: post #62

I think it’s a bit misguided in the pitch by too boldly trying to replace all buyer agents. A lot of what realtors offer, especially to first time buyers (~1/3), is emotional support and confidence/security for making the biggest financial decision in their lives. I don't believe an AI isn’t going to be able to do that. But if you’re a second+ time buyer, then I think it makes more sense.

I actually do believe that AI can make someone feel more comfortable with their purchase. Let's break down the communications that realtors currently do to comfort buyers (mostly over text, which is also how we communicate): Tell you comparably priced properties - we do this. Remind you the steps in the process - we do this. Tell you basic stats about local transactions (such as telling dejected buyers that only 1/6…

Fair enough, and I wish you luck because I welcome down pressure on existing fees. My take is simply that the positioning seems to unnecessarily make it a fight against all buyer agents, whereas it might be better to start by targeting the buyers who already "get it".

Re: Launch HN: Modern Realty (YC S24) – AI Real Estate Agent for Home Buyers

#96

Post by greenfish6 »

throwup238 wrote: post #61
greenfish6 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Our pricing is negotiable. What we're seeing so far is that >95% of homes are still offering full 2.4% buyer agent concessions in the bay area. Our main service is our texting service which you would text as if it was a normal realtor and it can get you market comparisons, schedule tours by texting agents, asking about if there's offers on homes, etc. Blockers for getting humans out of the loop is primarily just user…

> MVP has completed 1 escrow via text bot, we got paid 27k, another home went into escrow yesterday, 35 clients touring homes with us. We registered with our real estate brokerage in July. That's amazing traction! Congratulations! How much manual intervention did these first couple of sales take? Are you using your own local/hosted model and fine tuning or otherwise incrementally improving it?

Disclosures analysis and text-to-tour scheduling were first to be automated, and those were available for our first close. We now have market analysis, offer drafting, full AI texting, etc.

Re: Launch HN: Modern Realty (YC S24) – AI Real Estate Agent for Home Buyers

#97

Post by koolba »

itake wrote: post #67
keeptrying wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The ludicrous 6% fee is whats going to drive adoption by end users and in turn by brokers. Move that fee to 1% for buyer agent and you have a massive market.

The 6% fee was paid by the sellers, not the buyers. Buyers didn't pay anything to the agents. But even then, the buyer's agents would "refund" the buyer ~2% of the fee as a cashback incentive to use a specific agent. but recently, the rule changed so the sellers are only required to pay the 3% fee to the seller's agent and buyers need to negotiate their own deal with the buyer's agent. Currently, there are many broke…

> The 6% fee was paid by the sellers, not the buyers. Buyers didn't pay anything to the agents.

Buyers are the ones paying everything.

At 6%, that means the seller is willing to accept 94% of the sale price for the deal. So with a lower fee or simply less middle men feasting on low information transacters, a buyer with 94-100% could purchase that house and both parties would be happier.

Re: Launch HN: Modern Realty (YC S24) – AI Real Estate Agent for Home Buyers

#98

Post by theGnuMe »

itake wrote: post #67
keeptrying wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The ludicrous 6% fee is whats going to drive adoption by end users and in turn by brokers. Move that fee to 1% for buyer agent and you have a massive market.

The 6% fee was paid by the sellers, not the buyers. Buyers didn't pay anything to the agents. But even then, the buyer's agents would "refund" the buyer ~2% of the fee as a cashback incentive to use a specific agent. but recently, the rule changed so the sellers are only required to pay the 3% fee to the seller's agent and buyers need to negotiate their own deal with the buyer's agent. Currently, there are many broke…

>The 6% fee was paid by the sellers

The buyer is the only source of money. The rest of it is just a shell game.

Re: Launch HN: Modern Realty (YC S24) – AI Real Estate Agent for Home Buyers

#99

Post by alemanek »

I am actually your target market. We are looking to buy a house early next year. But, one thing that put me off is that you don’t list what fees you charge, is it flat rate or a percentage, ..etc.

In the FAQ I see this but no mention of the standard terms of the buyers agreement:

> Do I need to sign a buyer agreement?

> We will let you know if you need to sign a buyer agreement. You will for sure need to sign a buyer agreement when you submit an offer through us, but otherwise we can work out a timeline.

I know you just launched so not assuming any bad intent but it would be good to share pricing information for the services you offer. I have had to deal with lots of “Call us for pricing” in my day job. So, for stuff like this I just move on if I don’t see at least a price range listed somewhere upfront.

Re: Launch HN: Modern Realty (YC S24) – AI Real Estate Agent for Home Buyers

#100

Post by greenfish6 »

rpearl wrote: post #78
greenfish6 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Raffi, my cofounder, is an attorney himself along with having a Realtor license. Most Realtors are not attorneys. You said you needed to talk to an attorney but what if your realtor.... was an attorney? So we have more ability to handle edge cases, not less!

I mean the premise of your product appears to be that I'd be interacting with an AI. If I were to use it, I would not be hiring Raffi---would I? I was in a situation where the seller of the house, after signing our contract, halfway through closing, decided to try to accept another offer that would close faster. The seller attempted to get out of our contract when we wanted to enforce it and close. An AI wouldn't be…

The vast majority of agents communication is over text and email. It is quite rare that it is required that a realtor must make an in person appearance somewhere, usually that's just for first meetings.

But yes, when stuff like this happens, we'll have a person do the required representation.

Put it like this: if 90% of realtor time is spent on communication that is done over text an email, then each realtor will be able to serve 10x the clients. But that still leaves time for them to show up at a courthouse on a Friday, as you mention

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