Everywhere I turn, someone’s using AI to draft emails, summarize disclosures, or even suggest listing prices. I’ve been exploring what this means for real estate, and where the line is between useful tool and false confidence.
Personally, I find AI to be nearly transcendental in its possibilities, a tool with the potential to reshape how we live and work...as everyone has heard a million times by now. But the deeper I dive into its capabilities, the more I see things can and do go wrong. At a certain point you have to ask yourself, how accurate is AI?
I recently came across a study suggesting that professionals using AI believe they’re about 20% more productive, but in reality, they’re maybe less productive. I can imagine that being true, but mainly because this is still a new technology we’re all learning to use in real time, which takes time and effort.
For me, AI has opened up new questions and unexpected paths of discovery. More importantly, the interaction itself helps lift and parse ideas, helping to form and shape something larger and personally intriguing.
That said, there are obvious potholes in the road, mostly around how much we should trust it. A client recently told me he wasn’t reading the property disclosures as we were gearing up to write an offer. He was running the disclosures through AI. That gave me pause. I read disclosures cover to cover for my clients, noting every red flag or inconsistency I see. Still, I was curious. I had just reviewed a disclosure package for a home in the Outer Avenues and decided to run the same documents through AI.
And it did flag an issue I hadn’t caught, so I asked for the page number. The page it gave had nothing to do with the issue. I asked again. It gave a different page, with lots of confidence, I might add, but again, there was nothing there. The issue simply didn’t exist for this home.
At this stage, AI is like that person you know: fascinating, persuasive, but simply not trustworthy.
Final Thought:
AI can assist, but you have to ask how accurate is AI. It can enhance. But when you’re making one of the biggest financial decisions of your life, you need real experience, clear judgment, and someone who knows how to catch what machines miss. That’s why I still read every page.
Oliver Burgelman
Broker Associate
Vanguard Properties
DRE# 01388135
415-244-5846
