Daily Metaverse #70: Will VR real estate tours become the default?
Why drive around town when you can tour houses from your couch?
Today we’re starting with a story about YUPIX, a tech company working to bring real estate into the metaverse. They’re creating digital representations of properties and allowing you to tour them by putting on your VR headset.
I’m really excited about it because it strikes me as one of those really perfect use cases that has the potential to drive the metaverse forward in a meaningful way. First of all, it just makes sense - why spend all day driving around town looking at houses, when you can just pop on a headset and see all of them?
The advantages are both clear and easy for the average non-metaverse-nerd to understand. You’re saving time, plus you’re reducing carbon emissions and saving gas money (or car charging money) by not driving around all day. This is potentially even more advantageous for investors, who are open to looking in a much larger area than the average home buyer. It’s good for sellers and the efficiency of the overall real estate market as well - if it’s easier for people to visit your property, you’ll get more people into it.
Beyond convenience, VR tours also offer the benefit of customization and flexibility. Most people tour properties during the day, but if you’re buying a property with a nice view, you might want to see how it looks at sunset - no problem in VR. The same is true of décor - sellers spend thousands of dollars staging homes, because people have trouble picturing what empty rooms will look like when they’re furnished. At some point in the not-so-far future, my AI assistant will have a general idea of my style and will be able to decorate each home that I virtually visit just how I’d like it.
I should also be clear that these tours don’t just have to be for properties that already exist - YUPIX’s current project isn’t actually built yet. That’s obviously no problem in VR, and certainly a boon to developers looking to pre-sell properties that are still under construction.
I think this is also a case that the pandemic will help accelerate - where three years ago the idea of virtually touring a house was something of a novelty, COVID made it commonplace. A lot of folks will certainly be unwilling to buy or rent a property they haven’t set foot in, but I don’t even think that’s an impediment here - those folks can tour a lot of places in VR and then physically go to the best one or two of them. Physical visits may end up being more like property inspections in the buying process - you agree to purchase a house after a virtual tour but with a contingency that you’ll need to physically visit prior to closing to make sure everything looks like it did in the digital version.
The two barriers to adoption here will be getting properties uploaded and getting people accustomed to it. I think the latter won’t actually be that difficult, since the cost of touring things digitally is very low. There are certainly some people who won’t want to do it, but home buyers and investors are increasingly of the younger generation for whom VR and the metaverse are going to be totally normal. Ultimately, you don’t need the whole market to be onboard anyway - just enough that it’s worth sellers’ time to get their properties uploaded.
On that front, I do think things will probably take a bit longer, but there are plenty of companies that are pushing 3D scanning technology forward. At some point this decade, you’ll probably just be able to release a drone and have it scan a property as easily as you can set your Roomba to vacuum today.
I’m excited to see companies like YUPIX developing this kind of technology - real estate is a great use case with real commercial potential that will also make the stressful task of homebuying a bit easier for people.
Real Estate in the Metaverse
Miami tech company uses VR to bring real estate into the metaverse: It’s easy to imagine how this could become the standard for viewing real estate.
Smurfs in the Smurfaverse
The Smurfs are getting a village in the ‘metaverse’: Some headlines just can’t be categorized normally.
Hardware for the Metaverse
Inside the smell-o-verse: Meet the companies trying to bring scent to the metaverse: Silly and pointless or something that’ll really take metaverse immersion to the next level?
Sports in the Metaverse
Premier League teams are using VR to treat injuries and prep players for high pressure games: Preparing for an opponent in VR is a big advantage over doing it in front of a chalkboard.
Software for the Metaverse
Roblox CEO on Scaling a Future Metaverse: A clip worth watching.
Law in the Metaverse
Outside View: At Trademark Conference, Talk of NFTs, Metaverse and Counterfeiting: I’m genuinely surprised at how quickly lawyers have taken to understanding the implications of the metaverse - it’s not typically a cutting-edge profession.
Investing in the Metaverse
Nomura Explores the Metaverse in Digital Push to Lift Profit: As Nomura makes its way into the metaverse, it’ll bring plenty of investor capital with it.
Cheil invests in Korean metaverse company EVR Studio: $13M for creating digital spaces and avatars.