The Future of Real Estate

The real estate industry is facing major disruption according to many news sources. At the front of this disruption are many of the tech startups that are creating new ways for people to shop, buy, and sell their homes—cutting out the agent completely!

While we at Cook & James cannot see a world without experts in housing, we are doing our fair share of disrupting the industry--- but our innovations are for the good, and ultimately help customers see the value in a trustworthy agent that uses a convenient closing attorney. Our disruption is all about you, the agent. It’s what our “at-home” closing model was designed for.

In the recent article “The Future of Real Estate – With Fewer Agents?”, Devon Thorsby says that transparency and the availability of information has become vital to the homebuying process, evidenced by the rise of popular real estate information sites which offer consumers free access to potential home values and recent sales. This is a key point that Cook & James has taken a serious look at in the past decade, and one of the many reasons we use secure cloud-based closing software that keeps everyone in the loop; a major “wow” factor for your clients, as it allows them to be included in the closing process without having to pick up the phone… unless said phone is the device where the handy closing app was downloaded.

As with other industries, technology will certainly lead to streamlining in the real estate industry, and agents need to be prepared to stay up to date on all of these changes while making their clients feel comfortable and confident in their decisions; whether it’s future methods of payments, like cryptocurrency, or mobile closings—maybe even digital closings (we can dream, right?).

The future is convenience. It’s more than being able to easily get a hold of your agent after 5pm. Convenience is being able to check on your progress day or night, knowing that all of your clients’ sensitive information is securely stored and safe from email hacking and wire fraud, and knowing that when the day comes, your closing attorney will come to you and your client and dazzle.

There is a major shift going on with the historic role of a real estate agent: You’re no longer a guardian of home information – especially now that most people can find the home information on sources like Zillow or Realtor.com. You’re a professional service provider, a marketer, a security system. All of these things come with challenges, and Cook & James is adapting with the times to help you face these challenges. From our “at-home” closings & secure technology, all the way down to our real estate marketing services. We want to be the catalyst for these big industry changes- and make sure we all grow in the process. We could bring you donuts to try to lure you into using our closing services, but really, that wouldn’t be very disruptive for the industry, would it?

Give us a call to learn about our innovative marketing services that were designed specifically for real estate agents by the best in the biz. While you’re at it, ask about our at-home (or mobile) closing services. You might be surprised by the future of closings.