Virtual Reality for real estate has been one of the major trends in the industry in recent years. Implementing immersive technologies provides a number of valuable benefits, allowing real estate professionals to better and more easily reveal the potential of the property, as well as providing prospective buyers with exciting and immersive experiences.
Virtual Reality in Real Estate: Everything You Need to Know
Today, VR in real estate is an effective tool to complete a wide range of tasks, from virtual tours and walkthroughs of properties to promotional videos and real estate marketing. This naturally increases the demand for virtual reality solutions. According to a study by Goldman-Sachs, an estimated 1.4 million realtors will be using the technology by 2025, which will almost certainly make up the bulk of the total specialists in this field.
The importance of architectural visualisations and virtual reality real estate services is difficult to overestimate, as these technologies provide an unprecedented level of integration with objects due to realistic and detailed 3D models in virtual environments. So, it is not surprising that more and more business owners and real estate agents are striving to include virtual reality technology in their work.
Let’s take a closer look at the benefits of VR real estate solutions and how they are used to speed up sales processes and improve customer experience.
VR Real Estate Market Overview
When VR technology first appeared, it was initially seen as something unusual and exciting, but also expensive. Then, Oculus Rift and HTC released their first virtual reality headsets, making the technology more affordable.
With its infiltration into consumer markets and growing popularity, VR devices were initially seen as something closer to gaming than the real estate industry. However, given the potential and opportunities that VR provides, it was only a matter of time before virtual reality for real estate became commonplace.
Over the past 5 years, more and more companies and agents have been investing in VR, seeing it as a solution to their business needs. According to Statista, the AR/VR/MR market size hit $28bn in 2021, forecast to rise over $250bn by 2028. This demonstrates an upward trend, which means companies are successfully adapting VR real estate solutions to their operations.
Offering a number of competitive advantages, the demand for VR among architects, designers, real estate developers and agents will continue to remain high, giving professionals powerful tools to improve the quality of services provided.
Virtual Reality for Real Estate: Key Benefits
Virtual Reality real estate solutions provide advantages to all parties involved. Agents, business owners, potential buyers, and other stakeholders can benefit from virtual reality experiences and capabilities. At this stage, the real estate sector is among the industries actively implementing virtual/augmented reality technology. Last year, the global VR market was estimated to be worth nearly $60 billion and is projected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 27.5% from 2023 to 2030, according to a report by Grand View Research.
So, what are the benefits of virtual reality for real estate?
Fewer Physical Visits & Trips
With virtual reality tours, agents can noticeably simplify their workflow, as well as reduce costs due to fewer trips between apartments. By offering clients virtual house tours, a real estate agency can market and sell properties anywhere in the world.
Immersive Insights
Another valuable benefit of VR for real estate is the ability to interact with the property. Clients can explore the property in detail, walk around the space during an interactive tour and enjoy an immersive experience. This has a positive impact on the purchasing decision-making process and also allows clients to build an emotional connection with the property.
Cost-effectiveness
Although investments in virtual reality real estate software and the creation of 3D real estate tours can be expensive at first, it is a great idea that pays off in the long run. With feature-rich VR solutions, you can save money on premium-quality print materials, as well as fewer physical visits to objects.
Sense of Ownership
With 360-degree videos and immersive VR tours, a potential buyer looking for real estate at some point begins to perceive the property as their own home, discovering and feeling it in detail. This strengthens the emotional connection and increases your chances of successfully closing a deal.
Wider Coverage
By leveraging the power of virtual reality for real estate, you can greatly expand your reach as you eliminate the need to be tied to a physical location. This way, agents can increase their profits and the reach of potential clients because they get the opportunity to work with buyers from different cities and countries, which is one of the most valuable VR real estate advantages.
Use of VR in Real Estate
Virtual Reality in real estate has various use cases. With the increasing adoption of this technology, the ways of applying it are also expanding, providing agents with effective solutions and clients with exciting immersive tours and the benefits of remote exploration of real estate objects.
When it comes to the real estate market, the most common ways of using VR technology include:
1. Virtual Property Showcases
Virtual Reality has revolutionised the real estate industry by providing agents with an amazing tool to showcase properties. VR technology opens up unique opportunities, such as the ability for buyers and sellers to meet in a virtual space and view a property from anywhere in the world.
This is why 3D virtual tours are rapidly gaining popularity among industry professionals. Presentations can range from panoramic 360-degree video to fully interactive VR experiences. With a variety of formats, agents can conduct showings more efficiently and comfortably, increasing the quality of their services and customer satisfaction.
2. Architectural Visualisation
With the capabilities of 3D architectural visualisation, clients can feel and thoroughly examine their possible future home.
Today, leading agencies offer innovative showrooms where 3D models of various real estate properties are presented. This approach allows for a detailed exploration of the exterior and interior of the property, avoiding the need for a physical presence on the site.
Architectural visualisation effectively solves a whole range of problems facing designers, architects and business owners. In modern conditions, when remote interaction is becoming the norm, 3D visualisation has become a lifeline for many companies, ensuring full cooperation between customers, architects and builders remotely.
In addition, photorealistic and high-quality architectural renderings are perfect marketing materials, allowing you to promote your projects more effectively and increase engagement. That’s why it’s particularly important to adopt this new technology today when – according to a survey by the National Association of Realtors – 44% of clients search for properties on the internet first.
3. Virtual Visualisation and Staging
Market real estate under development has always been a challenging task, but modern VR real estate technology is improving the situation dramatically. Due to 3D visualisation and virtual tours, it has become possible to effectively showcase objects even at the design stage. This means that the absence of a finished property of furniture is no longer an obstacle.
By using VR real estate technology and virtual staging, agencies can clearly demonstrate both the interior features and the external appearance of future properties in virtual space, thereby facilitating the establishment of an emotional connection with the object and making successful sales long before construction is completed. And the statistics prove it: according to a Profile of Home Staging report by the National Association of Realtors, 77% of real estate agents say staging helps buyers associate a property with their future home.
4. V-Commerce
Virtual reality tours have one extremely useful advantage — they can be quickly and flexibly adapted to the needs of different target audiences. Thus, agents can create personalised presentations. For example, focusing on lighting solutions, design elements, and detailed angles for one type of client, or providing informative pop-up windows with accurate data, metrics, and dimensions for a rational type of client. Viewers also get ample opportunities for interaction. They can experiment with furniture arrangement, change the layout and colour schemes, and also select various interior elements for subsequent purchase through the built-in virtual commerce store.
Challenges and Considerations
As with any innovation, despite the potential of VR in real estate, mass adoption of virtual and augmented reality technologies faces several challenges: expensive investments in the development of VR/AR solutions, the need to popularise technologies among consumers, and the costs of regularly updating content.
Data protection and information security are of particular concern, especially when it comes to handling sensitive customer information in the digital environment. All these aspects require attention and adaptation of business processes for the successful implementation and adoption of VR technologies.
What VR Services VisEngine Offers for the Real Estate Market
When implementing VR technology into your operations, it is essential to partner with a trusted service provider you can rely on to ensure the security and effectiveness of the solutions.
By partnering with Visengine, you can gain competitive advantages by using VR capabilities and choosing the services you need to solve your specific problems.
Visengine offers high-quality and detailed 3D virtual tours, which make it possible to:
- Showcase properties under construction
- Provide virtual tours instead of physical visits
- Simulate real house walkthrough
- Share VR marketing materials on social media
- Generate more sales leads
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