These tech mistakes are devastating businesses, and are setting many real estate companies and investors up for bankruptcy.

Be sure you aren’t copying these blunders that can cannibalize your venture.

Artificial Intelligence

Just as spell check and autocorrect tools still haven’t been perfected and create a lot of frustration some 20 years later, there is still a lot of intelligence lacking in AI tools.

It may be trendy, and we all have to adapt to the times, yet, poorly implemented this is destroying even large multi billion dollar companies rapidly.

The biggest and most devastating issue here is installing AI chatbots and doing away with human customer service. It is just alienating the best leads and long term customers and revenue sources.

Then there is ChatGPT, spinning out cheap low grade content which is no doubt burning years of work and investment in SEO rankings. It may be used for expanding your non SEO content, such as emails, as long as you manually review them word by word. Though overall, it is likely doing more harm than good to most real estate companies. Many may find it costs an enormous amount to recover from these mistakes, if they can escape Google penalties.

Automated AI based decision making tools, such as for credit, also bring more risk than most have thought through. They have not been tested in the courts yet to fully see the liability at stake.

Privacy & Data Protection

Especially when it comes to plugging in new tech tools and automation businesses are requesting more sensitive data than ever. Including IDs, facial recognition verification, and more.

These are an area of massive legal liability. Only collect what you need. Only hold onto what you need. Be sure you are in compliance with data laws, and have the legal team and finances to deal with any issues that arise from data breaches and hacks.

Not Testing From A Consumer Perspective

Do embrace new technology. Just make sure you are first testing it thoroughly from your customers’ perspective, and routinely test it again.

If it is not adding value to them, and making the experience better, it will cost you a lot more than you think the efficiency is making you.

Failing To Hire The Best Talent

The best team wins. You may not be able to afford to keep up with paying current rates of $390k to $900k a year for AI talent. Though you can, and must afford the best business development and marketing managers you can find. Those that can bring years of experience across all mediums, channels, and technologies, and help implement the right choices for your company with a refreshed and modernized strategy and plan.

Failing To Update Websites

If your website is so outdated that it burns teenagers’ and childrens’ eyes, it’s time for a makeover. Today, it’s not only about design in visuals, but also carefully crafting words that sell.

Not Using The Data That’s Available

The recipe for success is combining human expertise and hard data.

Don’t guess what is working in your business and marketing, or believe the mainstream media headlines for what’s happening in the economy or with inflation.

Use the most accurate data you can find. Make sure that it is interpreted accurately, with relevance to your industry and individual business and customers.

Not Prioritizing The Right Metrics

When you start digging into the data it is easy to get lost and distracted with so many metrics.

Focus on your NPS score and real profit.

You are in real estate to make money, right?

Yet, the irony is that today so many businesses are making it increasingly harder for potential customers to give them money.

The slower money comes in, the higher the risk you will run into cash flow shortfalls, and miss out on the best buying opportunities.

The harder it is for buyers, renters, and investors to give you money, the lower the value of your product and service to them, and the higher the likelihood that they will just go fuel your competition with their capital instead. Today, convenience is even more important than price. Otherwise we wouldn’t have companies like Uber Eats, Doordash, and Instacart, all valued at over $20B.

Critical Mistakes Not To Copy For RE Pros & Businesses

One of the biggest problems in this industry is that so many otherwise highly intelligent real estate professionals and business owners think they ought to copy the competition, who they view as being successful.

Odds are that you don’t really know what’s working internally for others, or how broke they really are, and where they are bleeding money and customers.

Today, what is even more important than how many people are buying from you and giving you money, is how many are not, and who are going to feed your competition with more money to use against you.

Payment Options

Are you providing the payment options that work for your customers and are giving them the flexibility they need to pay you fast and consistently?

That may include Paypal, personal checks, bank wires, Cashapp, Bitcoin transfers, cash, or incorporating Buy Now Pay Later. Whatever your business model, incorporate as many as possible.

There should never be an excuse for them not to give you money.

Messy Websites & Detours

Some website operators appear to think that if one popup ad doesn’t work, it will work better if they throw up 5 or 10. More often than not, this is just going to turn off prospects instead.

You want to remove all roadblocks and streamline them purchasing from you, not add more hurdles.

Make sure your buy now button is big and obvious, and the process is simple.

Many sites now force people to sign up or register, which just sends qualified and serious prospects to the next competitor.

While list building can be useful, data is also becoming a bigger risk for businesses to collect as well.

Customer Service

Forget wasting money on expensive automated phone systems or chat bots that just drive customers crazy until they quit trying.

Whether you are renting or flipping real estate, investing $15, $33, or even $60 an hour for an on demand live phone rep to provide human service can more than pay for themselves. Especially when you consider the alternative is missing out on a $1,000 rent check, or $40,000 plus profit on a wholesale deal.

Is it the right time to sell your real estate investing business? If so, is your company even sellable?

This could be the ideal time for many real estate business owners to cash in and sell their companies. It is a window of opportunity many will kick themselves for missing out on.

However, not every company is positioned and optimized to be sold or bought. Let’s look at the timing, why you should be prepared regardless of your plans, and what you can do to make your company an attractive acquisition.

Why Now Is The Right Time To Sell

This is the phase in the real estate cycle when many real estate businesses may be peaking in value and appeal. It is also the same peak time in the general economy and mergers and acquisitions cycle for business owners to sell.

Many failed to see this opportunity ahead of 2008. Then either struggled for years while everything fell apart, or just closed the doors and quit, leaving millions of dollars in unclaimed value on the table.

This is a time in the economy when a lot of consolidation is in the works. Capital markets still have cash to fund acquisitions, and bigger companies want to expand by acquiring more market share.

That could all change fast in a downturn. The ability to buy may evaporate. Acquirers will be looking for steals, and to offer a small percentage of what they may offer now.

Why Having A Sellable Real Estate Business Is Important

Right now you may think you will never want to sell your business. That’s what most think, until the moment they need to. Yet, we never know where the market, company values, will go, and when for sure. We never know if we will be healthy enough to work tomorrow. Or if our families will need us to be present for them, instead of running a business.

Selling a business can provide a lump sum payday, ongoing passive income, or a combination of both, without having to be involved on a daily basis.

Even if you never sell, being sure your company is set up for it will only help increase the value of your assets, and improve your operations. You can’t lose. Yet, you can build millions or billions of dollars in extra value into your company, while going about your regular daily work. It’s virtually a no-brainer.

How To Optimize Your Company

Optimize your company for value and appeal by:

• Creating systems throughout your business
• Maintaining clean records, accounting, and contracts
• Use smart leverage for deals and keep your cash balance sheet healthier
• Make sure your business can run without your daily involvement

Despite all the talk about distress, mortgages in forbearance programs, unemployment, and businesses being locked down, the wealthy have not only survived unscathed, but have been enjoying great gains.

How are they doing it? How can individual investors and small real estate businesses make this their best year ever too?

Banking Billions

Data from Business Insider and The Guardian shows that America’s billionaires have only been enjoying more gains and wealth creation through the COVID pandemic and other chaos happening in 2020.

Within just 23 days of the first lock downs they added just short of an additional $300B to their net worth. By the summer they doubled that again to over $600B in new gains, adding almost $5B a day in profits.

Finding A Sweet Spot In Real Estate

One of the most notable trends we’ve seen since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic is a growth in house prices.

Some data does show that there are a significant number of households that have been lagging in paying their mortgages and rent. Yet, House prices keep on heading up. Partially in response to a major shift in where people want to live and the types of housing that are needed now. As well as an enormous amount of capital fleeing other scary and more volatile and risky investments.

We’ve continued to see the likes of Jeff Bezos adding to their big real estate portfolios.

House Flipping

More and more celebrities and business icons seem to be increasingly relying on real estate to protect and build their wealth.

Given the recent disruption in the retail industry you can bet that Tommy Hilfiger has been honing his skills at flipping houses over the past few years. He is now reportedly on his eighth house flip. His recently listed house in Greenwich, CT is asking $47.5M. Over $16M than he paid for it.

In the Hamptons, one luxury home flipper has just relisted a 6.7 acre compound for $72M. That’s a potential $27M gross profit on a property purchased in the middle of the pandemic in April 2020.

Scaling Your Own Wealth

You don’t already have to be a billionaire or a fashion celebrity to make this kind of money, or to make this the best year for your finances yet.

• Set really BIG goals

• Try joint ventures with new partners

• Use transactional funding for financial leverage

• Look to undervalued areas where the most people are moving