What do brokers really want from tech? One simple interface 

From CRMs to AI assistants, there is no shortage of tech in real estate. But all too often, solutions operate separately from each other, which can lead to a new set of problems.

Just ask the brokerage leaders who find themselves sticking with a less effective system because it produces useful reports or because it's something agents will actually use. Instead of living the all-in-one dream, they waste time bridging gaps that shouldn't exist.

"It's so many logins, so many different silos," said the owner of a 450-agent independent brokerage in Florida. "Right now, our tech is a hindrance to our business."

What Brokers Want From Technology Companies, a new report from management consultancy T3 Sixty, captures that kind of candid feedback from real estate professionals based on a review of 527 meetings held over the past few months. Of those, 140 conversations included brokerage leadership, and more than 50 focused substantially on technology in the brokerage space.

Integration, one way or another

Throughout those meetings, brokers frequently described existing tools as adequate individually but burdensome collectively.

Derek Taylor, T3 Sixty's senior vice president of technology consulting and the report's author, said brokers increasingly want technology that feels like an all-in-one system, with fewer logins and a simpler user experience.

"We are past the single sign-on dashboard. They really do not want just a dashboard. They want one user interface," Taylor said during a recent webinar.

They also want to be able to access their own data without running into restricted integrations, API costs or limitations of legacy versions of tools.

Those blockers lead to what T3 Sixty President and CEO Jack Miller referred to as "swivel chair integration," pulling a phrase from the report that describes employees entering the same information in multiple systems.

Measures of success (and frustration)

Brokerage leaders said they struggle to find quick answers to questions about their businesses, including profitability per agent, company dollar, effective commission rates, lead conversion and the financial impact of agent churn.

"A lot of reports that people put together from different systems take weeks to get done," one brokerage technology leader told T3 Sixty.

Pricing models are another source of frustration. But brokers objected less to the absolute cost of technology than to pricing based on seats, usage or other measures that make expenses difficult to predict. The report found greater interest in pricing tied to files, transactions or measurable outcomes.

Issues with adoption amplify these concerns. T3 Sixty's advisors cited typical adoption of brokerage-provided technology at roughly 15% to 20%, compared with 40% to 50% for the strongest CRMs.

Brokers told researchers they have become wary of paying for software that agents never use.

"Adoption is the product," the report concludes, arguing that vendors need to show brokers who is using their technology and whether it is producing results.

Brokers aren't afraid to build

Some brokerages are building their own tools, a development Taylor described as one of the most creative shifts he has seen among brokerage technology leaders in his 20 years in the industry.

Five firms in the sample have built or are building core platform components in-house, while three more have replaced commercial products with systems assembled using general-purpose AI tools. In each case, the report said, the trigger was a workflow or measurement problem that existing vendors had failed to address.

Miller offered a caution, however: Building software is easier than maintaining it. For tech companies, that reality may create an opening to solve problems that brokerages are no longer willing or able to solve for themselves.

Note: Real Estate News is an editorially independent division of T3 Sixty.