Matthew Daines, co-founder of lettingaproperty.com discusses how technology will change in the future to benefit both landlord and tenant:
“With such a wealth of affordable technology now readily available, landlords can optimise the marketing and availability of their investments to potential tenants far more efficiently than ever before possible.”
Online agents:
“The advent of digital marketing for landlords has changed the face of the rental market considerably, and with 95% of all tenants searching for properties online, the shift in landlords moving away from the high street is, and will continue to be, considerable. Many landlords are now recognising the benefits of using cost effective technology online agents such as lettingaproperty.com adopt to make it easier and cheaper for properties to be marketed to the masses.
Digital property inspections and agreements:
“Deposit schemes and tenancy agreements have long created problems for landlords, and an increasing number of tenants are requesting more reliable inventories as a prevention to secure a property and measure against unfairly lost deposits.
“Pen and paper inventories and agreements will soon become a thing of the past due to the traditional method being laborious and time-intensive. To counter this, digital property inspection systems and smartphone applications will soon become the norm resulting in a considerable reduction in the time it takes to complete a fast, reliable inspection and put a professional and legally-sound agreement in place.
“Lettingaproperty.com report that over 30% of their tenancy agreements are sent to both landlords and tenants in a digital format allowing both parties to review and sign their agreements from a place and a time suitable to them foregoing the need to meet each other or send such documents via traditional methods such as a postal service.
Video and app-based communication:
“Landlords will increasingly communicate with their tenants via video technology and social media, and with more landlords embracing sophisticated video making on their mobile device, it’s likely that interest from tenants will be qualified quicker because they have already seen the property layout online without the need to visit the property personally.
“With today’s technology, providing an e-commerce platform to engage and execute our objective has been tried, tested and successful. 4,700 landlords have already moved away from traditional methods and benefited from enlisting our online services. We have witnessed, first-hand, that the industry is poised for a significant momentum shift to a digital platform and we are poised to take the lead.
“At present, online agents showcase approximately 3% of the UK Estate industry property stock. With the speed and track record of how other consumer services have adapted to the digital age, experts believe this could reach an incredible 50% by the year 2020.”
