As our Power Broker Forum was taking place at the May NAR Legislative Meetings, Marki Lemons-Ryhal was hosting a session on Artificial Intelligence across the hall. While the Forum was packed with a standing-room-only crowd, I heard that people were lined up to get into Marki’s session (if you’ve ever seen Marki speak, this is no surprise).
Never one to miss an opportunity to land a good punchline, John Featherston opened the Forum by asking our audience if they were interested in artificial intelligence. Naturally, many hands went up. After an impeccably timed pause, John said, “Well, you’re not going to get that here. There is nothing artificial about what you do.” Big laughs and lots of nodding in agreement. Co-Moderator Lennox Scott then told us that AI has an additional definition at his company: Actual Intelligence. The crowd loved it.
While we didn’t cover artificial intelligence per se at the Forum, this “AI versus AI” theme still wove its way into the hour-long conversation on broker issues. And that’s exactly how it’s playing out in everyday life as well. For better or worse, AI is on everyone’s mind.
And actually, we’re not just thinking about it. We’re starting to use it. My husband, for example, asked ChatGPT to create a business plan, and it churned out a multi-page document with multi-year projections in about three minutes. Granted, some of the numbers were wonky and needed adjustment, but still…wow. Here at the office, we signed on with an AI service to transcribe our editorial interviews. While not 100% perfect, definitely 100% life-changing. Real estate professionals are out there using AI for listing descriptions, social media content and predictive analysis. We are all like kids in that one toy store that has the amazing toys you’ve never seen before; we’re wide eyed, mesmerized and excited by the endless potential for play.
But we’re also a little freaked out.
As we race toward the unbounded potential of this truly transformational technology, there’s this little nagging voice saying, “Watch out!” We’re worried about putting people out of work (writers are quite worried) and the unintended consequences of handing over even more data to the machines. The alarm sounded by AI “godfather” Geoffrey Hinton over AI’s potential existential threat has ramped up the anxiety. His apocalyptic warnings have left us feeling like the train has not only left the station, but is well on its way to jumping the tracks.
So have we made some sort of deal with the devil? Hopefully not, but as our panelists put forth during the Forum, proceed with caution. And they’re not the only ones. In March, more than 1,000 tech leaders, from Elon Musk to Steve Wozniak, called for a six-month pause on AI development and Sam Altman recently testified before Congress, urging lawmakers to put safeguards in place.
For now, the bottom line on AI comes down to one thing: Keep a human being involved. Fortunately, this is not a new rallying cry for real estate professionals. When it comes to securing their place in the real estate transaction, this is not their first rodeo. We’ve proven that the vast majority of real estate consumers will not buy or sell a home without a real, live person, so certainly no AI entity will replace a worthy real estate professional.
But an agent who uses AI to their and their clients’ benefit could very well replace those who refuse to use it at all. Let’s keep Lennox’s AI definition in mind as we wade into these unexplored waters—actual intelligence must go hand-in-hand with artificial intelligence in order to safely move forward.
