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With rent inflation on the rise, lettings agents are said to be increasingly turning to PropTech to manage growth rather than adding staff.
According to PayProp UK, agents are more confident in technology than ever before, with the majority believing that investing in automation is more productive and less costly than increasing staff numbers.
The claims by autopayment and customer accounting experts are based on recent rental industry research.
PayProp UK has released its 2024 Rental Confidence Index, which asked property professionals for their views on automation and technology.
When asked about technology investments and their impact on their business, 68.5% said automation would be more productive (up from 64.6% in 2022), and 70.2% said automation would be less costly (65.1%).
Neil Cobbold, commercial director at Reapit|PayProp, said: “Property professionals’ views appear to be more entrenched and bolder for 2022 and beyond. This could be due to the increased wage growth seen last year as a result of the cost of living crisis.”
“We also note that there have been recent multi-million dollar fines and claims levied against government entities, which may have increased awareness of other benefits of the technology, such as compliance assurance.
“Our research also reveals an increase in the number of people wanting to invest in PropTech, with 85.5% agreeing that PropTech is a worthwhile investment, compared to 80.7% in 2022.”
The top considerations when making a purchase were brand reputation (54%), support (37.9%), cost (37.9%) and ease of use (31.5%), followed by integration (30.6%) and system security (23.4%).
A change from the 2022 Index, the priority of safety of client funds has fallen from 80.2% to 11.3%, with system security dropping as well (from 60% in 2022 to 23.4%). This could indicate increased confidence in existing safety measures or an increased focus on other aspects of technology adoption.
“There was a significant increase in the priority of ‘integration’ from 5.2% to 30.6%, indicating a strong desire for PropTech tools to work seamlessly together to work more efficiently without having to log in and out of multiple separate systems, which is what we’re focused on enabling at Reapit | PayProp,” Cobbold said.
“Furthermore, when asked a follow-up question, 67.7% of respondents said they would prefer an end-to-end solution over a specialist platform. All of these results point to a desire to derive smoother operational benefits from PropTech tools that improve productivity, further empower teams across the country and allow them to focus on building the critical relationships that shape the real estate industry.”
In PayProp’s 2022 survey, the majority (68.4%) responded positively about the ongoing impact of automation on jobs over the next five years.
The latest data shows a diversity of opinions, with 66.9% still holding a positive view, but those with a negative view increasing to 6.4%.
“This change in attitude may mean that respondents have already automated processes that they feel would benefit from automation and believe there is limited room for further automation,” Cobbold said.
“Alternatively, the view may have been influenced by repeated warnings from firms such as PwC that generative AI could be used to commit fraud and would increase the amount of validation and verification that institutions would need to carry out.
“But AI can be just as useful in detecting suspicious activity by enabling agents to filter out fraudulent rental applications, property listings and documents.”
AI will “speed up real estate transactions and reduce costs”