Residential real estate agent Aaron Kirman, one of the top agents in Los Angeles by sales volume with more than $7 billion in career sales, has launched a new AI-
powered interface aimed at making it easier to sell properties.
The artificial intelligence platform, dubbed Estate Dynamics, mines data to match buyers with properties that are for sale.
For now, the technology is being used only by Kirman, but by the end of the year, his roughly 100-person team will all be using it.
Kirman said the platform would set his team apart in L.A.’s competitive real estate market.
“There’s a lot of agents out there; there’s millions of agents, and everyone kind of does a similar format,” he said.
Kirman already stands out in a crowded field.
He stars in CNBC’s “Listing Impossible,” leads the Aaron Kirman Group and is president of the International Estates Division at brokerage Compass. Kirman was No. 4 on the Business Journal’s list of top agents in L.A. in 2020 by sales volume.
He said the AI tool will help him find even more potential buyers.
An agent’s traditional approach is to take photos of a property, post them, then wait for buyers.
“I got tired of the sit-and-wait game and thought to myself, ‘Is there a better way to bring our inventory and our houses to the buyer pool and not wait for things like the MLS, Zillow and Redfin to help us?’” Kirman said. “We wanted to create a system so unlike what everyone is doing. We have something unique and proprietary that brings our exclusive listings to the buyer pool.”
The interface examines the online behaviors of potential buyers. It notices if someone looks at a particular school district or searches for a home with a pool or other specific amenities. Estate Dynamics creates a digital avatar of the customer, then targets ads to them based on their behavior.
To do so, the interface looks at APIs, or data, from multiple sources, including apps like Facebook.
“We’ve built a pretty substantial AI here,” said Patrick Bairamian, director of marketing at Aaron Kirman Group.
Kirman said the system allowed him to target buyers with his for-sale properties.
Among agents, he added, “there’s only so many systems we can all use, and the systems are all so similar. We wanted to take more control of the systems and own the data set. It helps in the process of property matchmaking.”
Kirman has been using the platform for about six months in a test stage. The focus so far has been on luxury homes, but it’s expected to expand to other price points.
“(The AI) can be targeted to anyone at any given price point in any neighborhood,” Kirman said. “Our ultimate goal is to sell the house. How we accomplish that goal we are open to. We feel like it gives us a competitive advantage.”
Kirman said he has had some buyers call him directly from the ads.
Although Kirman is an agent at brokerage bigwig Compass, he and his team developed Estate Dynamics separately.
The program was first discussed prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, but the pandemic “accelerated this process. More people are online, and data for searches for home has absolutely skyrocketed,” Bairamian said.
Kirman said he believes AI will mean big things for him and his agents.
“We’re really excited about this new project, and I think it will be a game changer for me and the industry,” Kirman said. “We are taking full charge of information and knowledge.”