The residential market has been quick to adopt listing platforms, but for commercial properties, listing websites haven't made an a significant impact. One reason is that commercial asset classes each operate much differently than one another. ApartmentBuildings.com is aiming to bring the ease of residential listing sites to the commercial real estate market by focusing on a single asset class: multifamily. The free site allows brokers to post all multifamily listings for investors to peruse, and they are ramping up for big growth later this year. We sat down with Apartment Building.com founder and CEO Scott Furman to talk about the site and how it is shaking up the multifamily investment market.
GlobeSt.com: What was the initial impetus for to launch ApartmentBuildings.com?
Scott Furman: The larger population has been neglected by the multifamily industry because of the current business model. There are a multiple of websites for single-family residences, but a lack of sites focusing on commercial real estate, especially the multifamily marketplace. Our executive team understands the missing components within our industry. With the evolution of technology, we saw a market inefficiency for a business opportunity, which ignited the idea behind the platform for ApartmentBuildings.com.
GlobeSt.com: Why did you choose to focus on the multifamily market specifically?
Furman: Our competitors focus on a variety of the commercial asset classes, and there is not one competitor exclusively specializing just in the multifamily asset space. As a website for the multifamily space, we are making it simpler to find and connect multifamily investors with brokers. We have a dual purpose to help expose agents' listings to a nationwide audience and to serve the needs of individuals looking to purchase a multifamily property.
GlobeSt.com: Tell me more about he site, and how it leverages technology to aid the brokerage community.
Furman: The multifamily marketplace is a highly localized, relationship-based industry, driven largely by the local brokers and investors who are purchasing in that marketplace. This traditional system has made it difficult for technological disruption. We believe that you still need a local, exclusive listing broker with boots on the ground to evaluate and show multi-family properties for sale. A great listing broker along with ApartmentBuildings.com will provide maximum exposure for a listing, which will create a competitive bidding process and net the seller the highest price.
GlobeSt.com: How has the site been adopted by the industry?
Furman: We have started to win over the industry organically. Within 3-years, and with only three employees until 2018, the company has a proven track record of 2x-plus growth annually. Outside of LoopNet, our company has the most Multi-Family properties for sale in our 5 current markets and we do not utilize any IDX feeds from the Multiple Listing Service.
GlobeSt.com: How do you think the platform will change the multifamily investment market?
Furman: With our executive team's industry knowledge, we understand the avenues for industry growth. We are able to collect and hone in on the information, simplifying it and making it easily available to the masses, which allows our targeted audiences to find exactly what they are looking for. ApartmentBuildings.com is the next generation of real estate technology. We are modernizing the traditional avenues of buying and marketing multi-family properties. With our proprietary domain name, we are aiming to become the dominant A-to-Z platform for the multifamily industry.
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Kelsi Maree Borland
