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Distant employees are a force to be reckoned with. About 12.7% of people in the US work as distant employees, while about 28% do a minimum of a component of their earn a living from home. Through the pandemic, we saw that, in most industries, employees could just start showing up on collaboration platforms from home, and the productivity wouldn’t drop. A robust argument could be made about real estate as one such industry.
To further support this claim, we’re witnessing the rise of virtual assistants. No, we’re not talking about chatbots and AI (although these are also quite useful). As a substitute, what we’re referring to are distant employees acting as assistants to real estate agents and professionals in general.
Listed below are some pros to enable you understand why this revolution is occurring at once and some cons to assist explain some of the challenges.
Pros of Virtual Assistants in Real Estate
Now, it’s greater than clear that there’s a reason more and more professionals need to hire real estate virtual assistants. Listed below are just a few benefits of this sort of employment which can be just too great to disregard.
Cost-efficiency
Virtual assistants are cheaper to employ than traditional assistants. They don’t occupy office space and don’t charge you for travel fees. In addition they don’t increase the fee of utilities and other overhead expenses.
One other hidden cost saving is that you just don’t need to buy their equipment. Sure, you’ll be able to chip in for a recent laptop or a phone, but this isn’t an industry norm. When applying for a position, it’s assumed that they’ve all of the equipment (which is rudimentary, to start with – nobody expects them to have a gaming PC and high-res camera).
It could not seem to be much, however it does make a world of difference.
Global Talent Access
Distant employees are pretty easy to rent, and on account of the character of the fashionable real estate business, you now not need to hire locally. It’s not like locals will visit these properties in person. A distant virtual assistant can just check the listings (like an everyday assistant would) and reach out to the parties in query.
Even regarding inspections, a virtual assistant can just negotiate with the local plumber and electrician. They will issue them a piece order in a digital format and receive photos and reports similarly.
Most significantly, distant work and hybrid work allow many opportunities for individuals with disabilities (who would otherwise be unable to travel to the office or find it difficult). The model also advantages working mothers.
Increased Productivity
Since they don’t need to return by the office, why not let people work the best way they’re the best? This implies distant employees can organize their very own working hours and their very own working spaces.
Now, in the case of tasks that aren’t time-sensitive, you’ll be able to work with deadlines, which provides you much more flexibility.
Keep in mind that lots of people decide to be distant employees not for the pay but for a probability to work this fashion.
The Majority of Tasks Support This Work Model
As we’ve already mentioned, the bulk of tasks support this work model to start with. All they need is access to the web and any device.
Most of their work will come all the way down to all sorts of analytics, administrative support, and market research, all of that are tasks that could be handled remotely without much difference.
Furthermore, even when you desire to dump tasks like sending your clothes to dry cleaners and picking up your coffee, there are such a lot of delivery services in your area that a virtual assistant can contact. In other words, not even this can be a real obstacle anymore.
Cons of Virtual Assistants in Real Estate
Now, talking about real cons is a bit dishonest, seeing as there aren’t any real disadvantages to virtual assistants in real estate; nevertheless, some challenges should be addressed. With that in mind, listed here are some challenges, bottlenecks, and problems that could be, a minimum of partially, endemic to virtual assistants in real estate.
Technology Reliability
Technical glitches could be a huge issue. They could cause trouble and disrupt communication. Either way, that is something that you certainly need to learn how you can cope with.
The incontrovertible fact that they’re from everywhere in the globe also implies that they may not have access to probably the most reliable web. Also, some areas are notorious for varied scams, so an assistant who reaches out from there might send the incorrect message. Still, this challenge shouldn’t be too hard to face in the era of VPN.
Security Concerns
Since they’re distant employees, you would possibly have limited knowledge of them in the actual world. This implies you’ve to bring in someone who you’ve a limited capability to vet or confirm. Still, the best way this is usually handled is thru the limited access feature on most collaboration tools and programs.
Also, if you happen to hire through an agency, chances are high they’ve already handled the vetting process, which is why you shouldn’t have a problem handling these items.
Training and Onboarding
Finding specialists is difficult and in the case of laypeople, it’s sometimes hard to get them accustomed to the peculiarities of the actual estate industry. Subsequently, you would possibly need to reinvent your training and onboarding, or on the very least, pay more attention to it.
Some entrepreneurs find it difficult to handle onboarding because of the shortage of physical presence of employees. Still, if we’re being completely honest and realistic, even physically present employees may depend on digital resources.
Wrap Up
In the long run, virtual assistants are a trend that may stick for one easy reason – they’re convenient. The employment model is useful to everyone, from employees who’ve more opportunities to real estate agents who’ve a deeper pool to pick from and fewer costs to cope with. As for the challenges, the bulk of these problems are either on the verge of solution or very solvable in the near future.