Technology is changing almost every aspect of the property industry, and residential valuations are no exception.
A recent Cotality special report, The Critical Role of the Valuer in the Age of Digital Valuations, explores how Australian property valuations are transitioning from traditional physical inspections towards increasingly sophisticated digital and hybrid assessments.
For property buyers, the development is significant. We now have access to extraordinary amounts of property information. But more information does not necessarily mean better property decisions.
At Master Advocates, we believe data is an incredibly powerful tool, but professional judgement, experience and human to human advice remain critical.
Technology Can Find the Data. Experience Interprets It.
Valuers can now access historical sales, comparable properties, aerial and satellite imagery, planning and zoning information, hazard data, easements and listing photography without necessarily physically attending a property.
Artificial intelligence and automated valuation models will make this process even more sophisticated.
But a computer identifying three comparable sales doesn’t necessarily mean those three properties are genuinely comparable.
Why did one property achieve $200,000 more? Was it on the superior side of the street? Did it have better natural light or orientation? Was the renovation significantly better? Was there unusual competition between two emotionally committed buyers? Was the floorplan inferior despite the database showing the same number of bedrooms and bathrooms? This is where information becomes knowledge.
Independent Buyers Agents Are Knowledge Workers
We see the role of an experienced Independent Buyers Agent increasingly as that of a knowledge worker. Technology helps us process information. Data helps establish evidence. Academic qualifications provide important technical foundations. But these need to be combined with something that cannot simply be downloaded from a database: boots on the ground experience.
An Independent Buyers Agent brings together market knowledge, property experience, academic qualifications, human to human consultation and professional judgement to reality check a client’s brief, budget and overall criteria. Our role is to navigate the noise of the market, interpret the information that matters and then turn that knowledge into action.
That begins with searching for suitable property acquisition opportunities both on market and off market. Finding a property, however, is only the beginning. We inspect, assess comparable evidence, perform due diligence, establish value, develop a pricing and acquisition strategy, negotiate, bid and ultimately acquire property in our client’s best interests.
Sometimes our most valuable advice is not telling a client how to buy a property. It is explaining why they shouldn’t buy it at all.
Due Diligence Is a Team Exercise
Independent advocacy doesn’t mean operating independently of other professionals. Quite the opposite. Our experience extends to informing, instructing and coordinating the broader professional team required to undertake appropriate due diligence.
Depending on the property and transaction, this can include building and pest inspectors, legal representatives, conveyancers, financial advisers, mortgage professionals, valuers and other specialist consultants. The buyer shouldn’t simply receive a collection of separate reports and be expected to determine what they collectively mean.
Our role is to help establish the questions that need answering, instruct the appropriate professionals and bring their findings back into the overall property and acquisition strategy.
What has the building and pest inspection identified? What does the legal representative see in the contract? Are there planning, title or property specific issues requiring further investigation? Does the finance structure work within the buyer’s actual budget? Does new information change what we believe the property is worth or whether we should proceed at all?
Our experience helps inform and instruct the greater professional team so our client can understand the collective findings and be informed, prepared and ready to act.
A Valuation Isn’t Necessarily What You Should Pay
This distinction becomes particularly important when considering valuations. A bank valuation primarily helps a lender assess the property securing its loan. The buyer is asking a fundamentally different question: “What should I actually pay for this property?”
That requires understanding not simply theoretical market value, but the quality of the comparable evidence, current competition, vendor motivation, property specific advantages and disadvantages, future considerations and the client’s individual circumstances.
Two properties can look almost identical in a database while representing completely different buying propositions. This is why understanding the street, immediate neighbourhood and micro market matters. It is also why professional judgement remains so important.
The Role Doesn’t End When the Property Is Purchased
The role of an Independent Buyers Agent also extends beyond negotiation, auction bidding and signing the contract. Once the property has been successfully acquired, there is still work to be done. At the other end of the transaction, we can continue coordinating with the client’s professional representatives and coordinate and facilitate the final inspection before settlement.
The acquisition journey therefore extends considerably further than simply finding a property.
At Master Advocates, that journey can include: Understanding the client’s brief and budget. Reality checking the criteria. Searching on market and off market opportunities. Inspecting and assessing property. Analysing comparable sales and establishing value. Coordinating building, pest, legal, finance and other due diligence. Developing the acquisition and negotiation strategy. Negotiating or bidding. Acquiring the property. Coordinating and facilitating the final inspection. Assisting the client through to settlement.
Technology can assist at almost every stage. But technology doesn’t take responsibility for bringing all those stages together.
Technology Should Make Professionals Better
The future of property isn’t technology versus people. It is experienced professionals using better technology. Property data, automated valuations and artificial intelligence should allow experienced practitioners to research markets, interrogate comparable sales and identify risks and opportunities with greater speed and sophistication.
But someone still needs to interpret that information. Someone needs to search both the on market and off market opportunities. Someone needs to walk the street. Someone needs to inspect the property. Someone needs to understand the neighbourhood and micro market. Someone needs to establish what represents fair value. Someone needs to coordinate the greater professional team conducting due diligence.
Someone needs to negotiate, bid and acquire. And someone needs to remain involved at the other end of the transaction, coordinating and facilitating the final inspection and helping the client move towards settlement.
Most importantly, someone needs to understand the buyer as a person and determine whether a particular property makes sense for their brief, their budget, their objectives and their future.
That requires something technology cannot replicate simply by producing more data. Human to human connection, consultation, experience and professional judgement.
At Master Advocates, we combine technology, market intelligence, academic knowledge, detailed due diligence and decades of boots on the ground property experience to help clients navigate the noise, make informed decisions and, when the right opportunity presents itself, get the job done. Because access to data isn’t the same as knowledge.
Data should inform the decision. Experience should interpret it. Independent advice should put the buyer’s interests first. Professional execution should take the client from the initial search through acquisition and ultimately towards settlement.
Mark Errichiello
Director, Co-Founder, Licensed Estate Agent, CEA (REIV), DipPropServ (Agency Mgt), REIA Diploma of Associate (AREI), (MAICD)
Where we serve:
• Victoria: Melbourne (Northern & Western specialists), Metro, Coastal & Regional — Victoria-wide
• New South Wales: Byron Bay, Byron Shire, Northern Rivers, Hinterland & Far North Coast
• Queensland: Brisbane, Gold Coast & South East Queensland (extended partner network)
Websites
www.masteradvocates.com.au x www.byronpropertysearch.com.au
Consultation Booking: