Editor's Introduction: The real estate intermediary industry is an important part of the real estate industry, and real estate intermediaries run through the entire process of economic operation of the real estate industry, providing diversified intermediary services for the production, circulation and consumption of the real estate industry. In the case of overall service upgrades, disintermediation is a means to achieve two purposes: service experience upgrades and transaction cost reductions. This article analyzes the real estate transaction industry. It is recommended for users who are interested in real estate transactions.
Looking back at the development of the domestic real estate trading track in the past ten years, the capital dividend has spawned a second-hand housing trading platform with considerable scale and strength, such as Shell To find a house, Anjuke, Tmall Good House, etc.
At the same time, the Internet, artificial intelligence and other technologies are widely used in the real estate transaction market, and the upgrading of technology has accelerated the evolution of the real estate transaction market.
Despite this, there are still bad intermediaries, fake listings, and inflated prices in the second-hand housing market.
From the perspective of "women spending 40 million yuan to buy a house suspected of being eaten by the intermediary 2.5 million price difference", the standardization of the second-hand housing trading market has a long way to go, and the "dark corners" such as intermediary standardized management, transparent transaction process, and price openness urgently need to be illuminated by the second-hand housing trading platform.
Recently, E-House and Tmall Good House have officially completed the acquisition process, one is a leader in the field of real estate circulation services, and the other is a real estate industry information service and digital marketing platform backed by Ali's e-commerce ecology, the combination of the two will inevitably be greatly strengthened, and the competition for the hegemony of the second-hand housing transaction market will become more and more intense.
Survival of the fittest is the norm in the Internet market. The focus of competition of the second-hand housing trading platform, from information supply, traffic competition, housing competition, intelligent technology competition, to comprehensive service capabilities and second-hand housing transaction models, and each stage is accompanied by the rise of new giants and the decline of old giants...
I. Stage 1.0: Sofang Network "Information Kernel"
In the "Internet + Real Estate" stage 1.0, Soufang.com (renamed: Fangtianxia) sat on the real estate information market, and the real estate market was still a different world at that time.
Before the real estate "touched the net", it was highly dependent on offline stores, and the information circulation was slow, incomplete and opaque, and people had a strong demand for real estate information.
Grasping this demand point, Soufang.com collects a large amount of real estate information and real estate content, and establishes a portal to provide users with massive information related to real estate.
For home buyers, the rich and comprehensive content services such as real estate, developers, and real estate news of sofang.com greatly reduce the difficulty of finding a house and comparing prices, which is a good tool; for developers, soufang.com brings considerable traffic to increase transaction volume, achieves revenue growth, and is a good partner.
The information distribution model that seems to be double-benefit has brought fame and income to Soufang.
On the one hand, the huge number of users and daily activity increases the brand exposure of Soufang.com, and the improvement of brand exposure will attract more users for it, so the virtuous circle enhances the market influence and market share of Soufang.com.
On the other hand, based on huge user data, Soufang provides media services and promotion services for developer brands and second-hand housing intermediaries, and charges port fees.
The core of the competition in the "Internet + Real Estate" stage 1.0 lies in the Internetization of real estate information, which is also the advantage of Soufang.com.
However, with the advent of the mobile Internet era, consumers put forward higher requirements for the authenticity of information and the efficiency of acquisition, and problems such as the messy housing data of the search network and the irregularity of intermediary fees have been exposed, and the decline in word-of-mouth users has also been lost.
Second, the 2.0 stage: anju guest "traffic is king"
In the era of mobile Internet, that is, the "Internet + real estate" 2.0 stage, Internet companies believe in the truth of "traffic is king", and the real estate industry is no exception.
Like Soufang.com, Anjuke also did "port business" in the early stage of development, which used rich and real housing information to obtain user accumulation traffic, and hyped up the slogan of free entry to attract real estate brokerage companies, and charged port fees to various real estate brokerage companies according to exposure or value-added services.
Unlike Soufang.com, Anjuke is more willing to spend huge sums of money on marketing than Soufang.com in terms of obtaining traffic.
In particular, after 58.com acquired Anjuke, Anjuke obtained the traffic of 58.com and the second largest shareholder, Tencent, and became the second-hand housing trading platform with the largest traffic scale.
58.com injects "traffic power" into Anjuke, and Anjuke builds a "moat" that is difficult for other platforms to cross by virtue of its traffic advantage.
Rising marketing spending also confirms the fact that Settlers "heavy traffic".
According to the prospectus, from 2018 to 2020, the advertising and marketing expenses of Anjuke were 1.373 billion yuan, 1.626 billion yuan and 2.373 billion yuan respectively, accounting for 22.09%, 21.45% and 29.49% of the total revenue, respectively.
In fact, most traditional industry networking starts from providing content services, accumulates a certain number of users and then monetizes ads.
In the "Internet +" stage, information (content) is the advantage point, in the mobile Internet era, traffic has replaced the status of information, which is also the reason why Anjuke quickly replaced the market position of Soufang.
To this day, traffic is still the driving force to promote the progress of Settlers, but online traffic is not inexhaustible, and the value of online information services is limited, real estate transactions will eventually return to offline, and Settlers who have left the transaction link have lost the qualification to obtain a bigger cake.
Third, 3.0 stage: Love House Yoshiya, Fangduoduo "transaction first"
In the "Internet + real estate" 3.0 stage, developer brands and intermediaries are not satisfied with the acquisition and exchange of information, increasing transaction volume has become the development consensus of platforms, intermediaries and developers, consumers also hope to improve the efficiency of house purchase with the help of second-hand trading platforms, and "traffic is king" will also give way to "transaction first".
In addition, based on the technical means at this stage, it cannot meet the needs of users to see and sign contracts online, and it is impossible to form a complete transaction closed loop.
Under this dilemma, the real estate O2O model that focuses on online promotion and offline sales transactions came into being, and a large number of real estate O2O platforms such as Aiwu Jiwu, Fangduoduo, etc. absorbed O2O outlet dividends, and ranked among unicorn startups online and offline.
Aiya Yoshiya was born with a halo on its head, accumulating $350 million in financing in just one and a half years, with a valuation of more than $1 billion. In the final analysis, the reason why capital favors Aiwu Yoshiya is that it is different from the logic and channel of real estate transactions in the 2.0 stage.
First, aiwu Jiwu's self-built online platform provides housing and reservation services, and sets up an offline broker team to carry out viewing and matching transactions, which has increased the volume of real estate transactions.
Second, Aiwu Jiwutu implements the "low intermediary fee + high commission" model, fully connects consumers and brokers, and grasps the "key figures" of a large number of real estate transactions.
Third, Aiwu Jiwu has improved the platform's customer acquisition, operation and service capabilities by upgrading Internet services, and has become the traffic and transaction engine of developers.
Coincidentally, Fangduoduo has deeply cultivated the O2O model and actively developed online layout offline stores, trying to monopolize all aspects of real estate from traffic to transactions through expansion.
In 2014, Fangduoduo landed in more than 40 cities across the country, penetrated more than 50,000 brokerage company stores, signed more than 500,000 brokers, and more than 500 projects.
The drawbacks of the O2O model of Fangduoduo and Aiwu Yoshiya are also obvious.
For example, the pain points such as fake listings, random price increases by intermediaries, and price opacity have not been truly solved, and the fundamental demands of home buyers have not been met.
In short, Aiwu Jiwu and Fangduoduo have built e-commerce platforms connecting consumers, brokers and developers for the purpose of transactions, breaking the long-standing business model of real estate platforms relying on advertising.
However, after several twists and turns, Aiwu Yoshiya collapsed and Fangduoduo transformed into SaaS empowerment, indicating that real estate O2O is not the end of Internet real estate transactions.
Fourth, 4.0 stage: shell to find a house "service first"
In the "Internet + Real Estate" 4.0 stage, the real estate trading platform has achieved further evolution from media to services to transactions, but the efficiency of real estate transactions, the quality of housing listings, and the distribution of intermediary commissions have not been eradicated.
In this regard, Shell has launched the ACN network and the real estate dictionary database online and offline, aiming to eliminate the problem of fake listings and bad intermediaries through digital means.
The ACN model solves the problem of bad mediation.
The cause of the problem of bad intermediaries is that the distribution of benefits is uneven, and the ACN model refines the entire real estate transaction process, and distributes commissions by measuring the contribution rate made by brokers in different links, which is more refined and standardized than the traditional commission model.
The real estate dictionary solves the problem of fake listings.
The principle of the real estate dictionary is to build a real estate database, through the city, urban area, real estate, building, unit, floor, house and other keywords to determine the authenticity of the listing.
This is a big project for Shell to find a house, but also a thankless project, because the construction of the real estate dictionary is difficult to achieve overnight, facing the challenges of insufficient market trust and long payback period.
Shell's ACN network and real estate dictionary database are clearly different from other second-hand trading platforms, and are the most recognized real estate transaction models at present.
The traditional "information core", "traffic is king", "transaction first" and other stages have ignored the service, and Shell to find a house to service as the starting point, to user needs as the center, to the transaction as the goal, the formation of a perfect real estate transaction ecology, which is also the shell to find a house can sit firmly in the leading position of the reason.
Overall, Shell House's all-dimensional investment in technical power optimizes the service capabilities of the real estate transaction chain, thereby raising the use value of Shell House for consumers, brokers, developers and other service objects, making it a "subversive" in people's eyes.
Stage 5.0: Bargaining Network "New Species"
Although Shell housing is based on Internet technology to improve the level of real estate transaction services, it still follows the transaction logic of "buyer - broker - buyer", and does not really use Internet technology to change the transaction process of the real estate intermediary industry.
In the "Internet + Real Estate" 5.0 stage, this problem is expected to be solved.
Whether from the perspective of mode or technology or marketing channels, bargaining network is different from all second-hand housing trading platforms on the market, and can be said to be a "new species" on the second-hand housing track.
In terms of technology, bargaining network further satisfies the information symmetry of sellers through the tu-type 3.0 plane multi-to-many plus-mark-down auction matching transaction technology developed by the national invention patent "System for Realizing Bidding Using Internet Audio telecom mobile network".
To put it simply, the bargaining network learned the practice of the auction house, gathered both the buyer and seller online, looked for a satisfactory and priced house through bargaining, and eliminated the previous one-to-one or one-to-two sales model, using a many-to-many method, which greatly improved the sales efficiency.
In terms of housing, bargaining network replaces the "broker" model with the "bargainer" model, the seller uploads the house and is responsible for the authenticity of the house, and the bargainer is responsible for organizing professional services such as transactions, trying to eliminate the existence of fake houses from the source.
In traditional real estate transactions, real estate agents must be professional real estate workers and agents are responsible for uploading and managing housing listings, occupying an important position in real estate transactions, such "exclusive power" is easy for bad intermediaries to exploit loopholes and create false listings and prices.
On the bargaining network, the "bargainer" who organizes the transaction can be an intermediary, a property owner, an auctioneer, and the listing is uploaded by the seller (owner) or the "bargainer", transforming the real estate sales thinking with the broker as the core to the buyer and seller as the core.
In terms of the entire transaction service, the biggest problem of the traditional intermediary is the excessive dependence on the store, and the bargaining network directly jumps out of the store's one-to-one matching service mode, fully realizing the online determination of the transaction price, and the offline signing and transfer to complete the transaction.
In this way, "de-storeization" has fundamentally changed the way traditional real estate trading stores are based, integrating information services and transaction services, and shifting real estate transactions from heavy assets to light assets, which greatly saves operating costs.
In terms of traffic, bargaining network promotes the fission marketing method of tushit private domain traffic of the whole people, and encourages the whole people to participate in investment promotion and promotion through the commission mechanism.
Bargainers can get bonuses by developing downlines and completing trading tasks, and bargainers do not limit region, age, gender, and the temptation and power of "bonus incentive + unlimited" is self-evident.
The many-to-many bargaining method of the bargaining network has changed the traditional one-to-one or one-to-many trading model, and the model of "removing the broker to promote the bargainer of the whole people" and "de-store" has changed the traditional transaction process and truly achieved the ultimate differentiation.
However, as a new species, the bargaining network will inevitably face the problem of user consumption habits and acceptance, and whether it can move from the main battlefield Guangxi to the whole country is still a problem.
The future: explore the "de-intermediary" no-man's land
The evolution of the development of second-hand housing transactions from information, traffic, O2O, and ACN has made prices more transparent, the channels for users to obtain housing more diversified, and the management of brokers more standardized, but even if the intermediary model has shifted from offline to online, black intermediary incidents have been repeatedly prohibited.
Nowadays, people talk a lot about "de-intermediary", and if this is feasible, the second-hand trading market will change dramatically.
First of all, the "de-intermediation" of real estate transactions is conducive to reducing the cost of brokers and improving the use rate of both buyers and sellers in the second-hand real estate trading platform.
Secondly, the listing information is entered by the developer or individual owner, which eliminates the malicious competition of bad intermediaries from the source and improves the authenticity of the listing. Moreover, in the future, more and more people are willing to choose the direct sales model, so that the sale and purchase of real estate will be as safe, convenient and efficient as other second-hand products.
It should be noted that once "de-intermediary" becomes a trend, then the current broker-centric sales model such as Settlers and Shell Houses will be eliminated, the real estate trading market will set off a new round of elimination, and the second-hand real estate trading platform will return to the same running line.
In this regard, the author believes that the "de-intermediary" cannot be fully implemented in a short period of time, but the platform can slowly weaken the "power" of the intermediary until the user forms the consumption habit of "direct sales".
For example, the bargaining network moves the transaction scene to the line, allows buyers and sellers to bargain directly through the Tushi 3.0 multi-to-many plus-down auction, and the broker (bargainer) only organizes the transaction and assists in handling the business.
In the long run, driven by the Internet, artificial intelligence, big data, virtual reality and other technologies, the future second-hand housing transaction process will be more transparent and more convenient, when second-hand housing intermediaries will be marginalized, and the first person to explore the "de-intermediary" no-man's land is expected to become a new industry leader.
Stage 1.0, Stage 2.0, Stage 3.0, Stage 4.0, Stage 5.0... The long river of time is rolling, and a grain of ash of this era falls on the real estate trading market, which is an opportunity for the bargaining network of new species, and it may be a destruction or a nirvana rebirth for traditional players to find a house and settlers.
#专栏作家 #
Liu Kuang, WeChat public account: liukuang110, everyone is a product manager columnist. Chairman of Hainan Sanche Network Technology Co., Ltd., founder of Buying Group Information, well-known self-media. It is the first in China to combine Zen Buddhism and Taoism to understand the Internet, and to combine traditional Chinese culture with the Internet, so as to form an Internet culture and innovative spirit with real Chinese characteristics.
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