In usual times, real estate has always been a face-to-face business.
But these are not usual times.
As the country sat through lockdown in Level 4 and restricted face-to-face activities under Level 3, the region’s biggest real estate company Barfoot & Thompson adapted its 97-year-old business with a suite of online tools.
The latest in the arsenal is Auctions Live, an online auction experience streaming directly from the barfoot.co.nz website.
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The online auction streams live on the Barfoot & Thompson website. Photo / supplied
“We’ve got a holistic suite of tools designed to help people in this period,” says director Stephen Barfoot, who was formerly the company’s chief technology officer.
“We’ve had the Barfoot & Thompson mobile app available since 2012. Now we’ve got online contract signing and virtual appraisals. We’re also offering virtual viewing using video conferencing tools, 3D virtual tours, virtual renovations, and even the virtual Furnish product that allows buyers to test their furniture in the new house.”
While others have had live-streamed auctions combined with phone bidding, Barfoot & Thompson is the first real estate agency in New Zealand to allow people to place bids online.
To participate, buyers register to bid either through a sales agent or directly on the barfoot.co.nz website. Auctions are streamed live on the Barfoot & Thompson web page. Bids may be made over the phone, or using the Bidder Auctions Live app on their smartphone or tablet.
Buyers download the Bidder Auctions Live app on their phones to make bids with complete security. Photo / supplied
“It is up to your level of comfort whether you bid with a salesperson on the phone or through the app. We don’t want people to feel that they need to use the technology unless they’re comfortable with it.”
The app allows for human error too, with a Withdraw Bid button and facility to change the amount bid, via a reset button. The company can also help with translations for non-English speakers, drawing on the more than 50 languages spoken by the sales team. The sales process is completed with the usual contracts, auction document and deposit arrangements. All bids submitted via the online system are legally binding.
Once lockdown is over, Barfoot & Thompson’s head of auctions Campbell Dunoon expects that virtual participation will supplement the in-person bidding in auction rooms.
“Most people like to see who they’re bidding against, so we still expect when they’re able that they’ll come into auction rooms.”
“We’re not replacing that experience, we’re just making it more convenient if you can’t come to the rooms,” adds Barfoot. Dunoon says that auctioneers are used to ‘‘performing’’ in auction rooms, so doing so in front of a camera is not a huge transition.
“Reading the dynamic will be different, but it’s a great solution for our vendors, a way of getting bids. We can still communicate with the buyer.”
Dunoon recommends would-be bidders can get familiar with the process by watching live auctions online.
“They can observe and experience from their couch.”
Barfoot says that the company had been scanning the tools for some time, with the Covid-19 lockdown accelerating the introduction, assessing multiple options before settling on the Auctions Live product for its simplicity and easy viewing platform on the barfoot.co.nz website.
“Our top priority was for it to be as simple and user-friendly for our customers as possible,” he says. “From the level of enquiry we’ve had via our sales team this week, there are a number of vendors who are keen to get underway with an online auction.
“This online auction solution provides relief to vendors who have sold and can now look to buy, as well as those vendors who had been ready to sell their properties prior to lockdown.”