Real Estate Investor Magazine South Africa April/ May 2020 | Page 40

SELLING
Online property
marketplaces
SIDIMA MFEKU
Globally, the need for physical sales institutions and/or buildings is
becoming redundant as a result of the digitalisation of the corporate
world. Online marketplaces are predominantly regarded as a force
for retailers shifting towards the digital space
It is through various tech trends that the digital space is
impacting the sector. Today, there is a wide range of property
apps that are set to benefit the business aspect of investing
in the property sector. Most of these trends facilitate the
relationships between different entities as well as players in
the sector to improve the transparency of real estate activities
and the relations among entities. Some relationships include
tenant-landlord, buyer-seller, estate agents-seller and the likes.
Besides just property apps, another online tech trend or
e-commerce that is set to take the property sector by storm
is online property marketplaces. The emergence of this
e-commerce where property sellers and buyers meet up
online for deals about properties on sale is growing remarkably
in the property sector.
Online property Marketplaces
Generally, an online marketplace is a type of e-commerce site
where product or service information is provided by multiple
third parties, whereas transactions are processed by the
marketplace operator.
“apples with apples,” thereby creating efficiency and
convenience for them in a way that saves time and money,”
Akinnusi says.
Do online marketplaces have value?
Having access to the internet and owning social media accounts
and a website is no longer enough for both manufacturers to
run a smooth and money-making business. The wide variety of
technologies that influence the competition make it incumbent
upon all property sellers to widen their marketing horizons.
“Online marketplaces are the
primary type of multichannel
ecommerce and can be a way
to streamline the production
process.”
Online marketplaces are the primary type of multichannel
ecommerce and can be a way to streamline the production process.
In times of economic volatility where confidence in the
currency of that particular country is low, the real estate sector
is often impacted, which in some instances results in the shift
in market of the real estate and property sector. It is sometimes
then that we hear of a buyer’s or a seller’s market.
CEO and Founder of online market place, MortageMarket,
Tim Akinnusi believes that property buyers use some real
estate sites to browse homes for sale, view property photos,
and look-up home values digitally using online market places.
He says online marketplaces are of great benefit to the real
estate sector.
“Online marketplaces in the property section have
enabled buyers and sellers to search for property for sale in a
convenient manner, by extension an online marketplace such
as mortgagemarketnow enables buyers to compare home
loan offers from lending banks in a convenient and transparent
manner to give consumers full control over their application.
Further to this, MortgageMarket pays customers up to R25,000
for self-serving,” says Akinnusi.
According to Akinnusi buyers are mostly reliant on these
e-commerce tech trends and these trends make their lives
easier. He says because marketplaces keep buyers abreast
about the markets, they should keep often touch base with
marketplaces as marketplaces help them predict the chances
of financially rewarding investments.
F
or a long time, the real estate sector has not foreseen
the disruptions of the property sector by technology
and some may have not seen the need for a digital shift
in this sector as going digital was viewed to be tailored for
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APRIL/MAY 2020 SA Real Estate Investor Magazine
other sectors and not the real estate and property. It is without
a doubt that going digital is a remarkable way of creating and
capturing value, and with this comes tremendous benefits
and impact to the growth of the industry.
“Consumers should care the most about marketplaces as
they stand to benefit the most from them. Marketplaces are
important to consumers as they help them make sense of
what the entire market has to offer, resulting in them getting
the best deals. They help consumers compare the proverbial
With marketplaces depending on the response of people in
order for them to accumulate action, it is important that the
question about the value of marketplaces is answered.
In his answer Akinnusi says, “the observation that the
actual marketplace platform doesn’t have value, is merely to
state that when buyer and sellers trade on it then it becomes
valuable. For example, booking.com as a marketplace holds no
value until hotels place their rooms on it and when users place
orders for rooms does it true value become realised.
Marketplaces are there! Ready to be used by anyone who
might want to sell their belongings. In the property sector
property sellers are welcome to make use of the marketplaces
because they are not marketplaces just for the sake of it.
An overarching conversation among real estate players is the
question of whether or not both traditional and online estate
agents can successfully make use of market places to advance
their business goals. According to Akinnusi both online and
traditional estate agents can work well with marketplaces.
“Estate agents can choose to use marketplaces such as
MortgageMarket to innovate their client’s experience by
creating a hybrid in which they inform clients of the best way
to access home financing. The estate agent can then benefit
from giving their clients access to an online marketplace, while
reducing the cost it takes them help customers find home loan
solutions. A marketplace like MortgageMarket.co.za also pays
estate agents a fee for referring their clients to it. This way, all
parties benefit from the technology innovation, the improved
service quality as a result of a consistent online experience and
shared monetary value from the marketplace,” He concludes.
SOURCE MortgageMarket
SA Real Estate Investor Magazine APRIL/MAY 2020
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