Real Estate Investor June 2021 June 2021 | Page 17

PropTech Categories Unissu , which manages and offers an online PropTech database , take an alternative approach to categorising the PropTech marketplace - based around an asset ’ s lifecycle . Their sample of over 7,000 companies includes Contech , but does not consider ‘ shared economy ’ to the same extent as Baum ’ s methodology .
Eddie Holmes , co-founder of Unissu explains : “ We have always worked on the principle that a PropTech business is first and foremost a company supplying technology to be used in relation to the underlying property asset lifecycle , from build to demolish and everything in between . For this reason , WeCompany and other Space-as-a-Service operators are not included in our figure . While flexible workspace providers are one of the biggest innovators in the property industry they are , at the end of the day , themselves property companies .” ( Faraudo , 2019a ).
PropTech Categories Major transformation in real estate first started with the arrival of multiple property listing portals such as Private Property and Property24 in South Africa , Zillow . com and Trulia . com in the USA and Rightmove and Zoopla in the UK . Improving access to multiple property listings at a click of button .
Pandemic Effect on Digitalisation & PropTech in SA The real estate practitioners I spoke to in 2020 said adoption of technology accelerated during lockdown and the onslaught of the pandemic . In just a few months businesses adoption of technology to meet , greet and attend webinars on platforms such as Zoom , Microsoft teams , Google hangouts , GotoWebinar and video calls all accelerated dramatically in 2020 .
Adoption of more project management software like Slack , Trello , Avaza and other cloud-based CRM systems was also a big trend . The impact of vaccines on the short-term rental market and the hype around Airbnb has driven more demand for more effective property management systems and software to effectively manage assets for both investors and property managers .
Online searches for residential property listings on portals have surged , while Facebook Marketplace and Fuel Flow have entered the fray . Quoin Online , an online portal for commercial listings for brokers and real estate owners for both buy and rent , are starting to make a big impact in commercial space . They have already introduced a transactional option to their listings in addition to already offering virtual viewings and tours , which has also become the norm . They recently listed 14 Nedbank owned properties for sale as the portal of choice .
Online estate agencies such as Lead home , Property Fox , Eazi Real Estate have become more established while
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