What does Peter Schravemade specialize in?

Peter Schravemade specializes in PropTech acceleration, property technology consulting, and international keynote speaking on real estate innovation. As Managing Partner of REACH Australia and New Zealand, he leads the official PropTech accelerator platform powered by Second Century Ventures and partnered with the National Association of Realtors®.

What is REACH Australia and New Zealand?

REACH Australia and New Zealand is the regional arm of the global real estate technology accelerator created by Second Century Ventures and backed by the National Association of Realtors®. Since Peter Schravemade's appointment as Managing Partner in 2022, the program has grown to become the largest Second Century Ventures portfolio outside the United States, with active investments in more than 50 companies across Australia and New Zealand.

What speaking topics does Peter Schravemade cover?

Peter Schravemade speaks on Property Technology Innovation & Trends, Accelerating PropTech Startups, Real Estate Digital Transformation, Global Real Estate Marketing Strategies, AI in Real Estate, and Asia-Pacific PropTech Market Analysis. He is a regular speaker at international industry events including Inman Connect, NAR Annual, MIPIM, and Property Portal Watch.

How can I book Peter Schravemade for a speaking engagement?

To book Peter Schravemade for a speaking engagement, you can contact him through the contact form on this website. He is available for keynote presentations, panel discussions, and consulting engagements across Australia, New Zealand, Asia Pacific, North America, and Europe.

What is Peter Schravemade's background in real estate?

Peter Schravemade is a 20-year veteran of the Australian property industry. He joined BoxBrownie.com in 2016 as Global Director of Sales, Marketing and Revenue, where he spent more than five years helping build the property marketing platform into a brand operating in over 110 countries. His own company went through the REACH US program in 2018, giving him direct experience on both sides of the accelerator model.

Tenant Privacy, Portal Profits and The Block Is Back

Episode 13 · 7 Aug 2026 · 1h 50m

This week on Before the Weekend, Kasey McDonald and Peter Schravemade dig into the Victorian petition to ban "continuous video sweeps" during rental inspections, and why the technology being described isn't what's actually happening, plus the data privacy questions nobody in the coverage thought to ask. Kasey sits down with Kasey Lawrence of The Rental Network, consultant, trainer, and the industry's unofficial agony aunt, on the "listen up" text message that mortified the internet, Victoria's prescribed rental application form, bond portability's teething problems, and why the money hiding in the average rent roll would shock most principals. Also this week: Cotality confirms the downturn has spread to Brisbane and Adelaide as the RBA meets Tuesday; REA Group grows earnings 15% on flat listings, and what that means for agents' and vendors' marketing spend; one year of CoStar-owned Domain, graded against the boardroom revolt in the US; whether off-market (or as Pete insists, "off-portal") sales have gone too far; the $52,000 strata levy letter no owner wants to receive; Peter's interview of the week with Ellis Taylor of Real Time; and The Block returns.

Full transcript

Kasey McDonald (00:05) Well, welcome to Before the Weekend episode 13. And we're unpacking some of the biggest stories shaping real estate this week. today we're talking tenant privacy, rental supply, government regulation, market trends, portal competition, and a couple of great conversations that are worth diving into.

I'm here of course with my amazing co host Pete. How are we today?

Peter Schravemade (00:33) Yeah, really good. Not complaining, on annual leave, as you can see. But the pod

Kasey McDonald (00:38) Yes, I can see you enjoying the sunshine.

Peter Schravemade (00:42) Yeah, I've got a tan.

Kasey McDonald (00:43) Yeah.

Do you actually ever tan? Like do you know, if

Peter Schravemade (00:47) I just have no

Kasey McDonald (00:49) You ever do get out in the sun, are you just one of those guys that goes a little bit reddish and then just goes white again?

Peter Schravemade (00:54) My p

my porcelain fine qualities don't handle the sun very well.

Kasey McDonald (00:57) Ha

Peter Schravemade (01:02) Yes, it's been a big week. well it be it you know, bullah from Fiji to start off with, it's it's lovely out here. But I won't rub all the listeners in into that, the fact that I'm on holidays and they're not. We'll move on very quickly.

Kasey McDonald (01:17) Yes.

Peter Schravemade (01:19) Big week on the numbers. So the REA Group released

Kasey McDonald (01:21) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (01:21) Its full year results today as everyone's aware. Yesterday actually. As everyone's aware, they're a publicly listed company, so that it's always worth following for interest. Cotality confirmed the housing downturn has spread to Brisbane and Adelaide. Not in big amounts, but this is pretty much in i in line with what Tim said in May before all the trouble started, even before the budget. the Reserve Bank Board meets on Tuesday. the block is back on our screens

are you a fan of the block?

Kasey McDonald (01:52) I d I do actually enjoy watching a bit only to get some of my own like renovation ideas. I then become

Peter Schravemade (01:55) My god, of course you do.

Kasey McDonald (02:00) The, my gosh, look at that kitchen. I think we should do this. What if we got rid of that vanity and we did that in here? so yeah, you can imagine how

Peter Schravemade (02:09) So funny.

Kasey McDonald (02:10) Many eye rolls I get from are he sitting next to me on the couch?

Peter Schravemade (02:12) Yeah, yeah, yeah. So

funny that you say, How do we get rid of that vanity, which is

Kasey McDonald (02:17) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (02:17) All about the block different vanity. but yes, yes,

Kasey McDonald (02:20) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (02:23) That's back. So we'll have a bit of a discussion about that. Plenty to get through before the weekend. we'll

Kasey McDonald (02:28) Yes,

Peter Schravemade (02:29) Roll into our I th I suppose our first story, which is one, I you know, I had this a lot in the industry back when I was at Box Brownie.

Kasey McDonald (02:39) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (02:39) We fielded a lot of questions, because there were a lot of questions going around at the time about 360 degree inspections. other people call them virtual tours, and there's a bit quite a bit to the terminology, and it actually comes out in this article. so we'll go through a bit of that, but I think the thing is there's a Victorian tenant called Kristie Hoskins, and she started a parliamentary petition calling for the Rental Tenancies Act to be amended to ban continuous video sweeps.

of occupied properties during rental inspections. The petition is sponsored in the Legislative Assembly. Of course it's sponsored by the Greens. Renting

Kasey McDonald (03:16) The greens.

Peter Schravemade (03:17) Renting spokesperson who's probably never rented, Gabrielle de V tre V tree, and closed this thirty first 31st of August. It has only a hundred and forty signatures, so popular. the look, there's a there's there's the bones of this is are if you if you're not renting you don't know what happens.

Mrs. Hoskins describing a three sixty degree filming of occupied homes. th this is widely spread, this is a widespread practice as far as I'm concerned. and we hear the former president of the REIV, Leah Calnan, says her agency uses them at entry and exit condition reports. It doesn't use them for routines, but they are used in the industry for routines, right?

Kasey McDonald (04:05) Yes.

Peter Schravemade (04:06) And the REIV are actually saying more regulation is unnecessary and I yeah, look, I'd have to say I'm on that camp, but concedes the practice can be obtrusive. inspection im imagery is regularly relied upon by VCAT in court for both agents and renters. Okay, talk d talk me through this, or do you want me to talk about the terminology that they're using first?

Kasey McDonald (04:30) Yeah, what she said what's dist dyst Pien? Is it how you say that? Dist dystopien didospien, yeah.

Peter Schravemade (04:34) Dist dystopia dystopian.

Dystopian, yeah, that's like a futuristic ever you're being recorded

Kasey McDonald (04:41) Right.

Peter Schravemade (04:41) Wherever you go. And look on that, just on the dystopian comment. we've got another one coming up in the where we're talking about property managers being recorded. So I will grant her that. I think

we are not keeping up as a society with the amount of technology, the amount of things in around us that record you, whether they are ring doorbells or you know, Google home cameras or whatever they are. my advice always to property professionals is to always assume that you're being recorded. Like there would be very few areas that you wouldn't. And I suppose the secondary privacy thing and this is the bit I'll grant I think it's Kristie Hoskins, is that

I don't think anyone's household should be recorded w without their permission. now don't forget we've done inspections before th this three sixty degree f photography ever existed, right? you wouldn't have used them as a property manager.

Kasey McDonald (05:50) No. No.

Peter Schravemade (05:51) No, yeah, we started using them in the day and they were highly effective. So a couple of things. Our tenants actually wanted them. So

We one of the reasons that has led to this is that we have the ability for property manager sorry tenants to say, You can come over to inspect this, but you know, you can't inspect this until another day. And it's way easier. Like a lot of these the people who are doing the inspections with these cameras are general maintenance contractors, they'll walk in, take photos, some of them are property managers, but it's a faster way to sweep the property and get out of your tenant's hair.

And then you can go back and look at these things later on. Now, I think both you and I would agree that there should be a tenant's right to say, no, I don't want I don't want my property photographer photographed, right? And there's a

Kasey McDonald (06:45) Great.

Peter Schravemade (06:45) Hundred reasons for that, like domestic violence, and an anonymity of where you live, personal photos on the walls, things like that. just personal things. there are there would be things at my house.

that I wouldn't be happy getting and these are not private or embarrassing. They're just it's my right to privacy to keep these

Kasey McDonald (07:08) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (07:09) You know, like my keyboard collection that I keep in my garage, which is now obviously out in the public space now that I've set it here. But if I was a tenant, I wouldn't want necessarily want that to be out there because if that image got out there, I might be a target for theft or burglary. You know, and there's nothing

Kasey McDonald (07:25) Yeah. Correct. Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (07:28) Nothing embarrassing about that. That's a perfectly reasonable thing for me to say, no, I don't want that photographed. You know what I mean? Like some people have expensive things, expensive bikes in their garage. so a lot of it's just about security. I think we're we're unanimous on that, are we?

Kasey McDonald (07:45) Yeah, definitely. I think you know, obviously tech's implemented like the property manager hasn't, I guess, invented the these inspections. It's been around how does

Peter Schravemade (07:56) No.

Kasey McDonald (07:57) Tech how, you know, technology has innovated and it's allowed us within the industry to utilize this type of technology. I think, you know, good property manag yeah.

Peter Schravemade (08:07) But just on just on that point,

just on that point, Kasey, this is a big that's a big thing that you just said. Though this is not bought in by property managers. This is a technological advantage

Kasey McDonald (08:15) Yeah, definitely. Yeah. Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (08:19) For speed and it's actually welcomed by a lot of tenants out there, and I agree that there are there will be a small percentage, but this is another instance, and just to point it out, this is another instance where parliamentarians have put legislation up that wedge the property manager in between the landlord and the tenant.

just for using things

Kasey McDonald (08:38) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (08:39) To try and make their jobs faster because of previous regulation that has come in and slowed things down. So we're in this never ending regulatory hoop that is ongoing over and over and over again. I and it really frustrates me that stuff like this is being bought up as though the property manager is the bad guy in this instance. but, yeah, sorry I interrupted you, but I it

Kasey McDonald (09:02) Yeah, no, that's okay.

Peter Schravemade (09:03) It is not technology bought in by the property manager, right?

Kasey McDonald (09:07) No, no, definitely not. And I think, you know, you're right. It's about the efficiency. But also, you are also correct in saying that some tenants are quite welcomed of it because it just means that you know, that time of doing the inspection might not be as long as, you know, the property manager actually walking around. And let's be real, you know, the photo can be taken as well, not just a video. But I think property managers

of course, need to understand and respect the wishes of the tenants. And I think that the majority of our industry actually does do that. And I also appreciate that sometimes and not intendedly, we might take a photo or the video might show something that might the tenant might not want in there. So I guess it comes down to in those situations, in understanding privacy is that our industry and the property managers, you know, where are you storing those photos? Who's receiving those photos?

How are you sharing those photos? You know, you know, all of those things. At what point in time? maybe are those files deleted at some stage? Maybe they're not, right?

Peter Schravemade (10:15) Mm.

Kasey McDonald (10:16) But I think, I think we all really actually try to do the right thing here. But again, I just feel like you, Pete, the government has tried to kind of bring this wedge in between how do we do our roles, landlord versus tenant, property manager versus tenant, property manager versus landlord. Like it just seems to be a battle of that us,

Trying to perform our role really well, provide evidence to protect the owner's investment, also support the tenant in, hey, this needs to be repaired, or this is not the kind of, I guess, living standards we're looking for. And then the property manager is able to present that back clearly in a video, in an imagery. So I feel

Peter Schravemade (10:55) Yeah.

Kasey McDonald (10:55) Like it's supporting both sides here by having the technology available. It's just about us using it responsibly, but without the government putting blame on.

or trying to wedge between, you know, all of the parties here in trying to achieve that outcome.

Peter Schravemade (11:10) Yeah. Well I've you know, and it works both ways. I've seen tenants

Kasey McDonald (11:13) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (11:14) Use subpoena the footage, the inspection thing where they felt that the property manager wasn't i you know, doing the right thing. So it c

Kasey McDonald (11:22) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (11:22) It can go both ways. You're you're dead right. The conversation should be more about what's the data privacy here, who owns the data

Kasey McDonald (11:29) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (11:29) To start off with? Is it is it the company that the larger company that's responsible for this? Is it the property manager?

I my guess is it's the it's the inspection app that is being used. I feel that there's more c you know, this could be resolved with the conversation there. Do you retain the data? Yes we do for the life of the but is it destroyed afterwards? Yep, it's destroyed, you know, a lot or it's destroyed after a period of time. is it ever used for anything other than the actual inspection? Well the answer to that should be no. So there should be a best practice guide,

for this kind of thing. Like this is the way we use it. And it could actually be that the technology involved here has that. And there's more technologies coming. I know there's one major

Kasey McDonald (12:16) Yeah, definitely.

Peter Schravemade (12:16) Provider, but I've seen three or four of these coming through the ranks. So this is this is not something that's going to go away. I would I would advocate for an opt-in. you know like if somebody didn't want this happening to opt in. But the stupidity of the legislation that like the

They talk about video sweeps. There's no video. It's it's a photograph. Yes, it's

Kasey McDonald (12:38) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (12:38) A 360 photograph that's stitched together. but the legislation that they're proposing could never get up because they don't know the problem that they're actually describing. And this is the stupidity and idiocy

Kasey McDonald (12:50) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (12:51) We see from well, I hate to say it from the Greens, but from any really at the moment from any political party that

are coming after the property professional. They just don't know what the heck they're talking about. but like I could I could ad advocate for this, responsible usage for this. I think I would have a thousand reasons as to why that could exist. there is even technology out there and I don't know if it's part of the app, but like let's say you did take a three sixty and there was something quite obviously personal or something that shouldn't be displayed there.

They there's technology that blurs that fairly easily.

Kasey McDonald (13:32) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (13:33) We see it in Google Earth, like they have automatic AI detectors that blur things. Like people's faces. For example, in a three sixty app. I haven't used this app for a very, very long time, but it maybe it's worth getting somebody in to tell us. It may even blur the people's images or things that it thinks is are of a personal nature or opt for that. But yeah, look, pfft, I mean, I think we can put a fork in that one. I

Kasey McDonald (13:59) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (13:59) I

just I'm just tired of legislation on the fly, right?

Kasey McDonald (14:03) Yeah, absolutely. I think you know, probab maybe this one is a bit in favor before we move on. but the Consumer Affairs Victoria has sent out a renting task

Peter Schravemade (14:13) Yeah.

Kasey McDonald (14:13) Force. and I just saw that pop up actually in the last few days.

Peter Schravemade (14:17) Yeah.

Kasey McDonald (14:17) They've been out inspecting advertised rentals across particular areas of Victoria to check minimum standards, right? So they're really ensuring that enforcement

Peter Schravemade (14:27) This is the group that can't

Kasey McDonald (14:28) Is in place.

Peter Schravemade (14:30) But this is the group that can't get you know, urgent tenancy hearings for

Kasey McDonald (14:36) Correct.

Peter Schravemade (14:37) Three to six months. Is it these are the same

Kasey McDonald (14:38) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (14:39) Clowns running that? I look I really don't have much nice to say about these people. Like why can't they fix that first? Th w go your hardest after that, but the one that is actually h hurting the consumer should be quite fixable.

That's just hearing more applications or putting more people on to determine these outcomes. I d I just I get really frustrated when I hear this kind of stuff. no, we're not do we're not doing that. We're not doing the simple things to fix it, but you know, make sure that you're advertising the right prices 'cause those evil property managers, they always do the wrong thing.

Kasey McDonald (15:14) Yeah. And I think, you know, they're they're they're looking at obviously pricing and the minimum housing standards. And I know in supporting our property management community, many of us are doing the right thing to ensure that the landlords that we're managing those properties for are doing the works required.

Peter Schravemade (15:30) Mm.

Kasey McDonald (15:31) And sometimes it's it actually is those landlords that just simply won't undertake what's

Peter Schravemade (15:35) Yeah.

Kasey McDonald (15:36) Required. So I guess there's probably twofold

Peter Schravemade (15:38) Sack them.

Kasey McDonald (15:39) Here, right? You've got those landlords who won't do it, and so from here is an order from.

consumer affairs to the landlord. So there's kind of a supporting piece for the PMs. But also the flip

Peter Schravemade (15:48) Mm.

Kasey McDonald (15:49) Side could be property managers, if you haven't done your role effectively and you haven't advised the landlord and you've been advertising it incorrect, then of course that enforcement order is going to come back through to you. So it's kind of, you know, it's one of those hard ones, but I agree. Should they be focusing on that right now? And maybe they maybe they should be, maybe they shouldn't be, but there is

Again, I just feel like it's this wedge is to who's gonna get the blame here. And unfortunately, I really feel like it's gonna be our property managers.

Peter Schravemade (16:20) Well, I d I don't think they should be spending time on that. Believe you me, like we have a friend who's been caught in a in living in a sub minimum standard rental in Brisbane. so this is not just happening in Victoria. I know it's sub minimum because there is a large amount of mould in his friend's room, which is by way by the way, if you're in that scenario you don't have to deal with that.

That's that

Kasey McDonald (16:44) No.

Peter Schravemade (16:44) Is well and truly under the minimum standard. So I know this is occurring at the moment. And they can't get a response out of their property manager. And I'm guessing the property manager is having trouble dealing with the landlord, right? So you and

Kasey McDonald (16:55) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (16:56) I have seen this all before. I know exactly about this. Consumer affairs don't have to go and inspect that. That is a waste of public resources. They should just have a simple form that says take photos, show us the minimum sta these things, these minimum standards.

Kasey McDonald (17:12) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (17:13) You and I can spot them in no time, Kasey. And you can spot them off a photograph. And that would tell you whether you should go to a property or not. But instead, these numpties are going out inspecting do like a random it's like a random tire pressure check in an age

Kasey McDonald (17:28) Yeah, it is. Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (17:29) Where we've got things that report the PSI of the tire. Like it that's that's effectively what they're doing. It's such a waste of time. Just set up a reporting mechanism. and

Well you know, I tell you what, when you what would galvanize a property manager and a landlord is if they got notice from cabs saying that your tenant has reported this issue, if it was a real issue, my goodness me, would you see the property management and the landlord, they would move in lockstep to get that fixed. They wouldn't want calves coming knocking, right? So it doesn't

Kasey McDonald (18:01) Mm.

Peter Schravemade (18:01) Have to be done in the way that they're doing it. Who is advising? Who is running cabs at the moment? Who is stupid enough to

Kasey McDonald (18:07) You know, obviously scare tactic, right? Like it

clearly is a scare tactic as well. But also, are they knocking on the door? You're not allowed to do that, right? Like you can't knock on the door. We can't as a real estate agent. Are they issuing the correct notification or you know?

Peter Schravemade (18:10) But it is that's a scare it's a scare tactic. And then I bet you they didn't find anything. I don't No, they're coming they're coming through No, they're coming No,

they're doing it through ones that have rental inspections. So they're doing it through there's no tenant in the pro Exact that's what they're doing. I'm like going what like

Kasey McDonald (18:26) They're doing at the time of the rental inspection. Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (18:33) But even that's pretty hard to pin because what if you've got something and they're saying this will be fixed before

Kasey McDonald (18:40) Correct.

Peter Schravemade (18:40) It's not

like you're not allowed to advertise it. So look, I just I don't get it. I if you were running a business, Cavs would not you know, you would fi you'd fire them all. Like you've got I'm sure there are some lovely people there, but whoever decided that this was the idea, rather than go, you know what, let's just set up a form on a website, they can upload videos and they can upload images and we can see, holy moly, there's mold in the corner of his room.

That's a hazard. They can't live there. You know, you think about the things that form minimum standards, broken stairs out the front, that they're very identical, identifiable. It's not like so look, yeah, look, I'm sorry if you're s you're a sales agent and you're having to listen to, you know, this property management speak all the way through, but this is that is incredible. The idiocy of that is nuts. Shall we move on? Yeah.

Kasey McDonald (19:34) Yeah. Well, let's move on. Cause I look, I guess

we're gonna go straight into another kind of, you know, investor property management angle this morning. maybe for the first few segments, I think, today. but

Peter Schravemade (19:40) Proper. We got a we got a few of We do.

Kasey McDonald (19:48) You know, articles are coming out that rents are gonna be rising at a rapid rate across the next 12 months and landlords are now looking to leave the market, right? So it's there's some

Peter Schravemade (20:00) Mm.

Kasey McDonald (20:01) Figures here.

that it's suggesting investors are exiting faster than they're arriving. And in May 2026, there was 5,447 sales advertised that were in fact investment properties, but only 3,900 approximately were purchased, repurchased then as rentals, right? So we've got a shortfall of about 1,500 rental homes in one month, right?

Peter Schravemade (20:29) Hm. Yeah, look,

I mean, this is this is led by Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra, though. We're not seeing that so

Kasey McDonald (20:34) Correct. Yeah. Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (20:35) Much where we are at the moment. and I would suggest this is only happening in areas where the supply and demand issue is not as high, which are those three. Sydney I you could argue the other way, but yeah, well look, I actually think if you gave this report to the government, they'd be happy about it.

Don't you? Isn't isn't this what they want? They want land the big greedy landlords selling and homeowners

Kasey McDonald (21:03) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (21:03) Buying it. Isn't this what they want? This is this was their

Kasey McDonald (21:06) The absolutely.

Peter Schravemade (21:07) Their stated outcome. I think the unent

Kasey McDonald (21:10) But only with rents

rising at two dollars a week.

Peter Schravemade (21:13) Yes, well, rents were yeah, that you know, economic modelling done by Treasury

Kasey McDonald (21:17) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (21:17) If I hear that one more time. but

Kasey McDonald (21:21) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (21:22) I it you know, you and I, just on a sitting in a pub having a beer would know that is not going to be the case. It doesn't pass the pub test. Rents

Kasey McDonald (21:31) No.

Peter Schravemade (21:31) Are going to go up catastrophically at a time where tenants could least afford it. yeah, like you the it's a misunderstanding that you

You know, when you design a new development, right? You're cutting up the land. Most good developers will sit there and go, What percentage of tenants versus owners do we want in this estate? And then they will design an estate around that. And like within their thinking is the fact that you need both of those. There are some people who will always choose to rent. they will never own a home.

And each to their own. Like I it's that's not a choice that you or I have made, but if they want to do that, then I would defend them that. And I think the acknowledgement that we're in a double sided market, that there is first hand buyers and there will be investors. we've never been in a scenario where that's different, even back to Jesus' time. you know, they still had people who owned property and

would let it out you know, in hotels or whatever. It's so to deny the dual forms of market is crazy. And at the moment I think I don't know whether they've intended it, whether they've missed it, but the person who's going to cop it is definitely going to be the renter. I can't see any way around that.

Kasey McDonald (22:57) Yeah, definitely. I think look,

there's you know, costs are rising everywhere, right? You know, you've got insurance premiums, you've got electricity costs, you know, i for a for a landlord themselves who are living in their own home, they're also experiencing those rising costs of living themselves. Not every investor in the Australian market is rich, right? And has got all of this dispensable money just sitting in the bank. you know, many of us.

Still working incredibly hard to ensure that we can have a great future and provide a future for our children as well. And I just think that both parties absolutely need each other. And it comes really back to this supply issue again all of the time. And the history tells us that when supply falls, that's when rents are going to rise. So it's it's probably whilst the government like might like those numbers that I just shared earlier, I

Peter Schravemade (23:50) Mm.

Kasey McDonald (23:50) Think the policy.

really just needs to encourage that long term investment needs to protect tenants as well. And it's not that not every tenant is also in a position. Those 1,500 homes, who's going to be able to now rent them if those landlords need to put the rent up in order to cover the costs. And that's what's exactly is happening. And so again, we're just going to find more people having this affordability problem. And then we're going to have all of these rentals on the market with no one being able to afford to fuck.

to rent them.

Peter Schravemade (24:22) Yeah, and I'm gonna dispute the fact that all of those houses are selling. Like we're not seeing half the houses selling at the moment.

Kasey McDonald (24:27) No.

Peter Schravemade (24:28) So it's not a case of landlords are fleeing the market and every single house has been purchased. I d I don't believe that's the case. I think there are a lot of them that are unsaleable at the moment that just aren't moving,

Kasey McDonald (24:39) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (24:40) Who are sitting there even worse vacant. so yeah, I

Kasey McDonald (24:44) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (24:45) Don't I don't I don't think it's anywhere near glowing or you know, I don't think we're in a scenario where

we've seen the end of this story yet by any

Kasey McDonald (24:54) No I

Peter Schravemade (24:54) Any chance, any stretch.

Kasey McDonald (24:57) No

Peter Schravemade (24:58) Now you did an interview, so every Friday on the show, or invariably every Friday, we end up talking about two things. I think how governments are rewriting the rules of tenancy and how the industry

Kasey McDonald (25:04) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (25:09) Behaves when no one thinks anyone's watching. They're pretty

Kasey McDonald (25:11) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (25:11) They're pretty clear. Like we've even touched on that today. So, you know,

Kasey McDonald (25:15) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (25:16) We've got government numpties trying to rewrite

laws around three sixty cameras, talking about them as they're video filming. and we've got how the industry should behave and how it's actually behaving when it doesn't think anyone's watching. So you caught up with Kasey Lawrence. What does Kasey Lawrence do? How does she fit into the picture?

Kasey McDonald (25:36) Yeah, well just to kind of add to the funniness of this, it's two cases with a K talking to each other and our names spelt exactly the same. So we had to have a little giggle as we were starting this interview. too many

Peter Schravemade (25:47) Yeah, it's way too much, Kasey, for my liking.

Kasey McDonald (25:50) Cases. I did actually make a comment to her before we went on air and said, Wow, Pete.

would not be enjoying this, being right in the middle of two cases, right? but no, Kasey Lawrence is from the rental network. a prior property manager herself as well, but is now a consultant and trainer working alongside property management businesses across the country. and what kind of has landed through her Instagram DMs is renters and owners sending her particular stories or evidences of

you know, somewhat our industry's bad behavior. And I think the story that she shares was it was a Melbourne renter who waited 18 months for a letterbox. And when it was finally installed, it was unannounced, 6:30, she was told by the agency director via a text message to listen up and stop complaining. and I think it was more about the behavior and the fact that

The agency director has kind of gone straight at that. You know, the renter was very much, hey, I get it. I asked for it, but just next time would be really great if you could just give me some notice. And, you know, there's prescribed forms for that, right? Around that. So

Peter Schravemade (27:09) Mm.

Kasey McDonald (27:09) It will she was, she was calm about it, the renter was, but the response absolutely made my jaw drop. So yeah, I think.

You know, did you get a chance to listen to a Pete? What's your feedback before we play the interview?

Peter Schravemade (27:24) It's interesting 'cause I think I think she's highlighting a lot of the things that we talk about. But there's a couple of things. So you know, Kasey Lawrence, Kasey L, she's backing up I think a lot of what we have already highlighted about the you know, let's the prescribed Victorian rental form. She's also echoing

You know, the story I told you before about I n I know a person who's living in a room full of mould, which

Kasey McDonald (27:51) Mm-hmm. Yep.

Peter Schravemade (27:52) Is clearly a breach of minimum rental standards. those tenants were unwilling to go to the property manager because they'd had so much trouble finding a home. and that's

Kasey McDonald (28:03) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (28:04) One of the saddest things that's come out of here. we've got a tenant who has rights who is too scared to use them because of the state of the market. And again, you know

all through this article screaming in the back of my ear is supply and demand, supply and demand. We don't have enough houses. If we had enough houses that tenant would have choice. They wouldn't have to stay in a mould infested, they could move. So but hey, let's

Kasey McDonald (28:25) Correct.

Peter Schravemade (28:26) Roll the interview and let's have a listen to what the two Kasey's have got to say.

Kasey McDonald (28:30) Yeah.

Kasey McDonald (28:31) Well, hi guys. welcome to Before the Weekend Podcast. And I'm excited today. I have Kasey Lawrence with me from the Rental Network. And that's two Kasey's with a K and our name Scott exactly the same. So when I first met you, I like, Wow, some of y'all know. Yeah. So something for us to connect about. How are you this morning?

Kasey Lawrence (28:52) Good, I'm good. Thank you so much for having me.

Kasey McDonald (28:54) Yeah, thanks for joining us. I've been loving what you've been putting out on social media, which I guess brings me to your first question that I've got here is the communication piece. You put a piece out on Instagram where obviously those that you're consulting with in the industry shared with you around what a particular principal in our industry actually responded to.

Can you share with me the details of that and what how this came about?

Kasey Lawrence (29:26) So this actually wasn't even a client. I get a lot of people who are living in the industry, not those working in it, but them living in it, owners, renters. I get a lot of outreach in my DMs for people wanting support and advice. So this just came from someone who follows me on Instagram and needed advice on the treatment they were getting from their property manager. So this particular

Renter had heard some, yeah, banging outside her house at 6 30 at night. She doesn't live in the best area of Melbourne. messaged her the director of the agency, which is her point of contact, and the reply she got was that it was someone out there installing her letterbox, which she'd been asking for 18 months for. She's been in there for 18 months with no letterbox. So she disrespectfully responded back and asked if she could just be notified next time because she wasn't sure what was happening. And that director responded back with the

Really abrupt and I thought it was quite disrespectful message just telling her to listen up and if she doesn't if she wants things done, don't complain and let them do it, basically. So yeah, mortified.

Kasey McDonald (30:33) Yeah, I guess it's, you know, you know, Pete and I have been consistently raising every Friday on the podcast around different behaviors of us as real estate agents, you know, misconduct obviously as well as just consistently at the forefront of social media. Yeah. you know, but to I guess hear that you've got renters. So they are the consumers in our market who look to us to find them a house to buy or to rent.

What they their request was not unreasonable. Let's be let's be real. so that would not have put a great taste in that renter's mouth. More importantly, they could also own property or know people that do, right?

Kasey Lawrence (31:17) Yeah, yeah. And there's just the fear, I guess, with the from a renter's perspective of they feel like sometimes they do need to shut up or they will be without a home. And it is a very fine line for them to have to navigate. And that is, I guess, why I get so much outreach in my in my DMs. And if I can empower everyone in the industry, not just agents, owners and renters, with the knowledge and advice.

to stand up for themselves respectfully and know their rights. yeah, I'm I'm more than happy to respond every day of the week to be able to hopefully then make positive impact on the industry. If we all kind of can just respectfully work in the industry and live in the industry, I feel like it's such a toxic cycle between owner, agent, renter, owner, agent renter. There's there's a lack of respect within that triangle going all different ways.

So yeah, I'm just trying to change that a little bit and I yeah, it's it's hard.

Kasey McDonald (32:20) Yeah, it definitely is. And I think, you know, we've we've seen as well different aspects of exactly that agents attacking agents, right? Sales agents doing that, you know, stealing signboards and you know, just all of this crazy stuff as though that's what we actually need to do. Whereas you know, we really need to showcase to the consumer that we are professionals. Yeah. And I think that's the piece that we miss, you know, we

We are all passionate about what we do. We should love what we do, right? You know, for many of us, you know, I think you and I are on the same page is that we love this industry. We've been in it for a long time. And that's why we have, you know, that's why we consult and we want to be that trusted advisor in those spaces. And I think everyone needs to look at what we say and how we act. because it can be looked upon in a in a different light and not actually gen it might not generally be your character.

Kasey Lawrence (33:15) Yeah, yeah, that's right. And I think the message I try and get out to owners is just to be so diligent with your agent selection because that will if we can get more owners being more diligent with who they choose to manage their property and not just basing it on a one or two percent fee difference, that is detrimental to them being able to maximize their return, retain their investment, retain good tenancies. There's so many positives in

selecting the right agent and eliminating the cowboys of the industry who are behaving like this towards the clients who are their bread and butter basically.

Kasey McDonald (33:53) Yeah, really

what a great point. what's the one tip you know you could give in this situation to property managers who also are listening today, but more importantly also saw your post?

Kasey Lawrence (34:05) Yeah. I think that there's there's so much power in building positive relationships with your clients and that's not just your owners, your renters as well. And once you have those positive relationships with your clients, the job is so much more enjoyable and from every aspect by every party, because then there is mutual respect between one another. You know, there's leniency, there's enjoyment in the job and people can enjoy where they live.

maximize their investment return. So that's one thing I could get out there and pass on is just to work on building positive relationships with your clients because the impact it then has is tenfold on you yourself as the agent, but the industry as well, because they feel that through the work that you do.

Kasey McDonald (34:49) Yeah, yeah, really great tip there. I know you do a lot of work in the Victorian space and you're definitely across some of the changes or a lot of the changes that are going on down there. I feel so incredibly like just terrible for property managers and landlords within the Victorian market at the moment. There's just been so much all at one time. But if we could talk first of all on the application form. So

obviously there's a change within that. And we also saw more recently as well a particular prop tech company has been finding ordered to make changes. So can we talk through what's on the what's on the ground this impact having on property managers and renters?

Kasey Lawrence (35:39) Yeah, I think well with regards to that application form, Victoria is actually behind on that. I know Queensland and SA have got a very diligent application form they've had for a while now. it's just getting used to that new process. There is a lot of fear definitely on the ground from the leasing teams. actually just did a blog post on the value of leasing agents at the moment and how important they are. because there is fear of

saying the wrong thing. So there's no conversations happening at the opens. And, you know, that's definitely impacting key tenant selection and setting that tenancy up for success. If we're not having conversations around who's coming to our opens, we're not able to ascertain who these people are. And there's fear around what they can and can't ask and the conversations they can have. So they're just not having them.

Kasey McDonald (36:27) Yeah. Yeah, that's really sad. Yeah, like it are there's obviously things that they aren't now able to ask. Can you talk us through what some of those things are?

Kasey Lawrence (36:38) Yeah, so we've got a prescribed form and we cannot ask any questions outside of that form or any or add anything else to that form. So there is limitations around pets, children, their social status, their religion, all of those general things that are I don't think, out of the ordinary. It's just people trying to navigate or get information.

To base the application on. I do think there is a little bit of overthinking happening with it because of the fear it is so new down here in VIC. There's people are overthinking it. You know, we can still get rental references, we can still confirm employment. And they're the two key aspects. Once we've chosen a tenant or a renter, or the owner has selected a renter, you can then

Organize your pet clause if they've got a pet. It just can't be asking that question and basing the application on them having a pet or not. But once you've approved someone, I think that's probably one of the biggest sticking points is the worry around pets and not being able to ask that. But you can ascertain that after you've chosen your renter and you know you're organizing the leases, you can put the pet clause in the lease. So, you know, there is ways to navigate around it once you've chosen your right renter, but just focus on what we've always focused on, affordability on the rent.

and you know good rental history and employment. They're the key aspects in selecting a tenancy. and just your gut feel and first impressions. Yeah.

Kasey McDonald (38:06) And I think to your point, you know, I don't think that our teams or our people should be afraid to just make sure that they are talking, right? Because I think a gut feel and sometimes what you learn about people at those open homes, and that doesn't mean you've got to dive into, you know, all the nitty-gritty about them as individuals, but it's more about, you know, what brings you here today is talking about what do you like about the home and you know, just

Just a general conversation because then you really kind of get the feel about maybe who they are and cross-referencing that against anything they might have noted on their application.

Kasey Lawrence (38:44) Right? Yep, absolutely. Can't be gut feeling first impressions.

Kasey McDonald (38:49) Yeah, definitely. And I guess the next biggest change and more recent change that came out was around bonds. So talk me through that. What's the what's the talk on the ground about how this is getting rolled out?

Kasey Lawrence (39:02) Yeah, well it's rolled out, it's happening. there was a lot of confusion initially. I think there still is a little bit. I think some of the teething problems have been ironed out. There was a perception that anyone that from a renter's perspective that they're leaving, you know, it automatically happens. They have to go through an application process, a tenancy to port their bond to another home needs to be like for like. So a whole household needs to be moving to a new property to utilize that bond port.

it can't be individuals coming together in a home and grabbing their bond from here and here and putting it together. so that was, I think, a quick one that was ironed out. I just think around, you know, a lot of the changes, there is a lot of grey areas that us that are physically working in the field have the questions but don't have the answers to when they are being rolled out because I guess they're being rolled out from people not working in the field, respectfully. so

lot of questions around or what happens here or you know if it's I can't think of any off the top of my head right now, but I think that was the main thing that there was teething questions that needed to be answered. You know, how long is the delay between requesting to utilize this scheme and getting it approved? And is that going to then delay a start date on a property? I think that was a big one too that was coming through from a lot of agents.

Kasey McDonald (40:24) Yeah, right. Yeah, is have you seen anyone actually transact yet? Like has it has a transaction?

Kasey Lawrence (40:31) Yeah,

yeah, happening. Yeah, it's happening. Yeah, yeah. I think it's I think it's a I don't see any negative in it in terms of you know, there'll be opinions from the government and interest and all that kind of thing. but in terms of in the field, in the industry, as agents, I don't think there's any negative impact around that. It doesn't affect our ability to be able to make claims on bonds, it doesn't leave the vacating property owner.

At a loss by any means, they still have a bond to claim on. so from us, it's just a slight administration change. Yeah.

Kasey McDonald (41:07) Yeah.

Okay. in terms of, you know, I guess what else you're sort of hearing on the ground, I know we've been chatting for weeks and weeks around the budget and tax reforms and I guess how that's impacting investors. Yeah. What are you hearing from those businesses you are consulting with? More importantly, I guess the property managers. Yeah. Have their conversations changed? Are their investors under pressure?

Kasey Lawrence (41:34) They're yes and yes, but not as many conversations are changing or happening as I would have liked. I'm definitely talking to all of my clients about that and have been for a while in terms of talk to your owners, find out where they're sitting in this and what support they need, are they able to retain? Do they need to sell? Can they hold? So if we're not asking those questions and having those conversations with our owners, we've got no idea where they're sitting in this. You know, we could have one owner that is needing to sell.

But an owner that is looking to increase their portfolio. There could be a transaction within our own rent role there or multiple, you know, but we're not having these questions. We're not having these conversations. We don't know where our owners are sitting. So I think we need to absolutely be speaking to our owners and being, you know, you spoke earlier about the trust, being a trusted advisor. That is absolutely where we need to be with our clients at the moment in this industry and market as it stands today. We have to be.

their trusted advisor. We need to be asking questions, maximizing their investment, you know, helping them retain it if they can through maximizing it, minimizing vacancy and all of those value ads that we are as their trusted advisor.

Kasey McDonald (42:46) Yeah, and if there was one tip, Kasey, that you could give our agencies and our property managers today, what would that be?

Kasey Lawrence (42:56) Around the owners and own and retaining properties. Yeah. I think absolutely having the conversations for sure. They need to be having conversations with their owners. They need to be diligent with their tenant selection so that can set the owners up to have a successful tenancy. They need to be building positive relationships, like I said before, doing all they can to minimize the owner's vacancy, maximize their return, and protect their investment. They do that through.

positive relationships, because when they've got them, the tenancy goes smoother. There's less issues, less issues at the vacate, meaning less vacancy time for the owner, less, you know, work on the property between tenancies. So having conversations for one, building positive relationships.

Kasey McDonald (43:42) Yeah, great. Look, you know, I still obviously am speaking to a lot of property managers and agencies and what I'm doing. And what I'm still seeing in our industry is the fear of our property managers picking up the phone. Yes. And we are still hiding behind email and hiding behind thinking that the automation in the technology is enough and it's doing the job for us. So I think, you know, the key here and to reiterate what you've shared.

Is a conversation, guys, is not an email. a conversation is picking up the phone, talking to them, getting them to trust you. Yeah. Listen, right? And listen to what

Kasey Lawrence (44:23) Yeah, and getting off chat GPT, you cannot, you know, grow as an individual, understand what you're talking about if someone's giving it to you. You've got to learn it yourself. You've got to read it, understand, find the answer if you don't have it. if you are constantly plugging and playing in chat GPT and AI, you are never ever going to confidently be able to have those conversations on the phone because you don't have your lifeline there of your AI telling you what to say.

Kasey McDonald (44:50) Yeah, yeah, really, really a good point. Yeah, and in closing out, Kasey, tell us what you do at the Rental Network and if anyone would like to connect with you, yeah, we'd love for you to share.

Kasey Lawrence (45:01) Beautiful, thank you. I am very heavily at the moment doing a lot of health checks on rent roles. So I'm a consultant and trainer in the industry. And yeah, this year has been the year of the health checks with clients, which is really good. And that essentially is diving into their rent role, having a look under the hood and really analysing where they're at, profit-wise, systems and procedures, the organization of the business, staff, and giving them a detailed report to get them to

where they need to be to be as profitable as possible. Client service is at its peak. Staff retention and happiness is all there. so yeah, they've been really, really popular this year, which is great. I've been able to get some really good results for my clients. You know, the last I could probably count on the last five that I've done, we've been able to uncover anywhere from a hundred to three hundred K sitting in their portfolio without adding any extra properties or any extra staff. So

Kasey McDonald (46:00) Well Don, that's gone.

Kasey Lawrence (46:00) Yeah,

yeah, there's lots happening, so it's it's good.

Kasey McDonald (46:04) Yeah, excellent. and if for any of our listeners today, how can they connect with you if of course that they're interested in one of those health trips?

Kasey Lawrence (46:12) Yeah.

Yeah. You can jump on my email or Instagram, tha dot rental dot network. I'm sure you'll put my contact details in here somewhere. So yeah, phone, email, social media anyway is fine.

Kasey McDonald (46:25) Yeah, great. We'll add Kasey's details to our podcast. you'll be able to link there through to her Instagram and of course her email. But thanks for joining us, Kasey. I really appreciate your time and just, you know, of course, sharing your view of exactly what's going on and inside the four walls of property management divisions.

Kasey Lawrence (46:45) Yeah, yeah. Thank you so much for having me. I've loved it. Thank you. Thanks, Kasey. See ya.

Peter Schravemade (46:51) Kasey, great interview with Kasey. The letterbox story,

Kasey McDonald (46:56) Right.

Peter Schravemade (46:57) Eighteen months of asking, then listen up, don't complain. obviously

Kasey McDonald (47:00) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (47:01) We've got some cowboys in the industry. how common is that behaviour, do you think? Is it the outlier or is it the open secret? Do we see that widespread?

Kasey McDonald (47:11) Look, I don't think there I to be honest, I actually don't know, right? I guess I think we do have cowboys. and I think that sometimes this behavior happens independently and by individuals and sometimes agencies directors don't know, but I think the key here is that this came from the agency director, which is probably the most disappointing thing. you know, I think,

Peter Schravemade (47:35) Yeah.

Kasey McDonald (47:36) You know, it's probably not a secret that there are individuals that

don't perform and behave in the way which they should. And of course, it's something we speak about every single week around the misconduct and behavior of our agents.

Peter Schravemade (47:48) Yeah, yeah, and her the th I discussed it before, I gave a bit of a spoiler, but her point that renters stay silent out of fear of losing a home,

Kasey McDonald (47:55) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (47:56) I think that is a symptom of the vacancy rate. not necessarily an industry culture problem. I think when you're a tenant and you have tried for nine months to get a rental and you finally get one

And then you move in and there are elements of that rental that need correction. You and I both know that the we get more maintenance requests as property managers just after someone's moved into a property, right?

Kasey McDonald (48:25) Mm-hmm. Correct. Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (48:26) Like there's there's that's when they all come through. I will have properties that are lived in for three years happily.

There'll be a change of tenant, and I'll get as the tenant goes in, I'll get a raft almost like a shopping list of things I want to wanna improve or about this property because it's not either not to their standard or there are things that actually need replacing.

Kasey McDonald (48:45) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (48:47) And I would hope most good landlords go, okay, yep, that's correct. That's correct, that's correct. That sure living standard, you accepted this property as is, you need to go with that one, you know, like it might be put an air conditioner in or something like that. So I'm I'm well

Kasey McDonald (49:01) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (49:02) Aware that.

We get requests. I would like to think it's not an industry culture problem, but I think a lot of property managers are writing off the back at the moment that they can find another tenant so easily. You and I have practiced through a time where we would actually do our utmost to appease tenants because we know that if they leave that property, the likelihood of us finding another one in you know weeks is very unlikely, right? Yeah, but I

Kasey McDonald (49:30) Yeah, definitely. I and I think,

yeah.

Peter Schravemade (49:32) I saw

a store a story in Brisbane saying that the average day vacancy for a ten a tenanted property in Brisbane is five days. I don't even I don't even think you can change over in five days. Yeah.

Kasey McDonald (49:41) Mm-hmm. Yeah. But and obviously with those rents increasing too, right? No, you can't.

You can't even you can't even do what you're required to do in your role effectively. That includes doing the works, right? Like, yeah. Yeah. You c you can't effectively do that within that time period. Yeah. Yeah. But I think it comes

Peter Schravemade (49:51) Ex exit report the cleaning all the clean Yeah. Yeah. No. Yeah.

Kasey McDonald (50:02) Back as well to you know.

The agents selecting the right types of owners and the right types of properties that they want to manage as a part of that, you know, you're going in and yeah, you know, absolutely we want to grow our rent role, we want to add value to our business, we want to be making more money, but at the end of the day, not every business is good business. and so we also need to be considering, you know, is that owner wanting to come with us, you know, or negotiating on our fee? Because we've simply said to them at that stage.

Now that it's vacant, we need to do these works before we actually get a new tenant in. And it's a requ you know, it's required for us to do that to ensure not only is it meeting minimum housing standards, but it's from the health and safety of the tenants who are going to be moving in. And if you've got those owners at those times who are saying, No, I'm not doing that, you know, then I think we need to sit back to understand, are they truly the types of owners that we also want to be having within our portfolio as well?

Peter Schravemade (51:01) Yeah, agreed. I think points on the prescribed form tell me that legislative change hasn't hasn't happened. So yeah, agents

Kasey McDonald (51:10) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (51:10) Are now afraid of saying the wrong thing. Conversations that

Kasey McDonald (51:12) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (51:13) At opens have simply stopped because everyone's worried about cabs coming in and doing a check. So

Kasey McDonald (51:18) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (51:19) Now we have it's e I think it's even worse for tenants because now we have simple decisions being made on whatever is on that form, which

won't necessarily be fiscal affordability. It'll be whatever they it the land the property manager needs to make a judgment call and based on that I don't even know how they're doing it. but yeah it's a it's a recipe for disaster. I c I actually think there could be room for a class action to come back and say, you have

bound me to a fiduciary obligation to act in the best interest of the landlord. And then in addendum legislation, you've taken a away that right. I can no longer decide who is the best for this property. it's a it's a very interesting one. But I obviously I'm not a solicitor or a lawyer. So this is just my

Kasey McDonald (52:11) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (52:11) Opinion. It appears that this p prescribed form

takes away the fidu fiduciary obligation of the property manager in Victoria to do the right thing.

Kasey McDonald (52:22) Yeah.

And I guess it's just, you know, there's all of the compliance and there's all of these rules. And there's just been so much that has obviously come into play in legislation that has changed. And I guess, you know, she raised a point around kind of navigating. And it's kind of looking at, okay, this is now how we need to operate. And what could our and should our practices be? How do we navigate around that without, you know, breaching anything within the legislation?

Peter Schravemade (52:47) Mm.

Kasey McDonald (52:48) So, you know, it's probably.

You know, taking on board what those changes are and looking at how do we make those changes work within our and our businesses to ensure we're also not breaching them as well.

Peter Schravemade (52:59) Yeah. We do need to move on. I'm

Kasey McDonald (53:02) Yes.

Peter Schravemade (53:03) Well aware that we spent twenty minutes on that and yeah, we could we could

Kasey McDonald (53:06) On property management.

Peter Schravemade (53:08) Probably we could probably talk about that for forever at the moment. I think it's a area of our industry that is really, really hurting right now, both the tenants, the property managers a and to an extent the landlords.

Kasey McDonald (53:21) Yes, absolutely.

Peter Schravemade (53:22) Let's go into our next one. So this is totality figure. So

Kasey McDonald (53:26) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (53:26) Home prices fall. We you talked about this at the start. So co ta Cotalities figures show national home values fell 0.7%, the sharpest monthly drop. Sydney was one point four, Melbourne was one point two, they were the bigger ones. The I think the new part of the story is Brisbane's down point six and Adelaide is down point two. So not big falls, but it's their second consecutive monthly fall for both of those.

And the combined regionals recorded that first decline. So now we've got nearly everything on decline and we can actually

Kasey McDonald (53:57) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (53:58) Say the Australian housing market is in decline. so la what I you know we got the RBA meeting on Monday, Monday and Tuesday,

Kasey McDonald (54:10) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (54:11) And so we're expecting a decision there. All four major banks are saying they expect a hold after three hikes this year, though a majority of surveyed economists still expect

at least one more rate rise in twenty six. what do you think?

Kasey McDonald (54:28) Yeah, well, inflation came down slightly, right? And yeah, I think,

Peter Schravemade (54:33) Mm-hmm.

Kasey McDonald (54:34) Yeah, you know, is it the RBA is consistently come out in the last few weeks saying that they don't look at housing, I guess the pricing s stabilizing or reducing is a factor in their decision. in whether or not they hold or they increase or reduce rates. So I kind of find that

interesting. but yeah, I think look, we all know and we've been around in the industry, well, certainly you and I have for a long time, but those newcomers who are listening to our podcast today, you know, the market goes and moves in all different directions, but it similarly goes in patterns, right? And so it goes up and it can go down, but then it goes back up again, right? So I think having this kind of balance out to kind of bring back a level of

affordability of, you know, where should our housing prices be positioned is, you know, and stabilizing that. It's not, I don't think it's necessarily bad. I mean, yes, we buy our homes to create some capital wealth for all of ourselves. But I think the real question is, is the market actually catching breath? Like is it actually just trying to go, where have you know, we've been going at such a hard, fast pace for so many years that it's just taking a little minute? Like what's, you know, I think that's kind of

More the question here. but I'm very, very interested to see what the RBA does on Tuesday.

Peter Schravemade (56:00) Yeah. Yep. I'm tipping they leave it the same. That's my tip.

Kasey McDonald (56:05) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (56:05) I also think i think it's gonna be an interesting time. I suspect if we remain like this for the remainder of the for what's left over of the Lab Labor government's Kenya, we will probably see an unprecedented drop in home prices, you know, to the extent of between eight and ten percent. And

That kind of drop will be catastrophic for anyone, any of

Kasey McDonald (56:30) Yes.

Peter Schravemade (56:31) The f new first-hand buyers. now you and I are homeowners, so we know very well that probably both of us are going to be fine writing out ten percent drops.

Kasey McDonald (56:42) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (56:43) That you know, well, I don't know that for sure, but you know, I don't want to speak on your behalf. But yeah, but a ten percent

Kasey McDonald (56:49) I hope I'll be okay. No, I should be fine.

Yeah. Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (56:53) You know, a ten percent drop.

So, you know, what that means is if you're holding a house for two million, you're gonna lose two hundred thousand dollars of that value. So if you have leveraged the house at one point eight, you know, it's now what it's worth. But if you've just borrowed two million dollars to pay for a two million dollar house and in less than six months or mu just over six months, it's now one point eight, you are now in two hundred thousand dollar deficit.

And it was very interesting this week no listening to the government talk about a negative a negative equity s scenario, which that is, that's a negative equity scenario. That means

Kasey McDonald (57:29) Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (57:30) That your home loan exceeds the property value, which means that you effectively owe money and you'll you're you're two hundred thousand dollars behind in the asset

Kasey McDonald (57:43) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (57:43) That you have. Not a not a good story at all.

but that is

Kasey McDonald (57:46) No.

Peter Schravemade (57:47) The I think that's the biggest concern out of all of this is that we're about to see greater negative equity scenarios. And I think everyone's still holding. I think buyers are holding, I

Kasey McDonald (57:58) Mm. Yeah, I agree.

Peter Schravemade (58:00) Think sellers are holding, I think investors are definitely holding. There are some out there talking opportunity, but the market's not moving enough for them to have been in it. and the even the banks don't know what to do with our loan scenarios. Like there's a there was a widow tax that

we might get a chance to talk about today. But even

Kasey McDonald (58:16) Yes, I saw that article. Yeah. Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (58:19) Even on the back of that, the banks wouldn't issue a loan for this poor this poor person because they had no certainty. And so when you've got banks and you've got landlords, you've got homeowners, first home buyers, you've got all the sellers, nobody's actually doing anything. It just

screams of a lack of confidence. We don't know what the heck is going on at the moment. I think everyone

Kasey McDonald (58:45) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (58:45) Other than the RBA who are just looking at fiscal figures and making decisions on that, that seems to be where we're at.

Kasey McDonald (58:53) Yeah, definitely. And I've was out visiting a few of our customers actually earlier this week and just in all different areas, actually, here of Southeast Queensland. and I asked the question of, you know, how's business and how's it going? And from a you know, sales and rental perspective. And they've said that their listings while still getting the inquiry from buyers, but

You know, as sales agents, they are now needing to work. Every single inquiry, they are following up diligently, whereas we've experienced in the market that we haven't needed to do that, right? But they

Peter Schravemade (59:32) Mm.

Kasey McDonald (59:32) Had they did say listings are still coming to the market, but slower. price corrections are definitely occurring, but those that they have had on the market are now sitting longer than ever before. So it the pace has definitely slowed.

but they have still seen buyers coming to market, but it's just definitely taking longer for them as well to make the decision.

Peter Schravemade (59:58) I spoke to one technology provider this week who suggested that they had twenty customers since July one. So twenty real estate agencies shut up shop, not sell. Not sell.

Kasey McDonald (1:00:14) Mm-hmm. Just close, right?

Peter Schravemade (1:00:17) Just close and

They will be, th this person said to me that they are rolling into other offices. So this might be an operator who is independent in its own right. there is movement going on in the in the real estate market. There definitely is. And you know, at the moment I can't say whether that's a good thing or a bad thing. for them, maybe it's a great thing. I don't want all this paperwork, AMLs being too hard. you know, there could be a bunch of reasons.

so I'm gonna hinge, you know, I'm gonna hitch my cart to a larger brand or a f I think we're definitely seeing a bit of movement to larger franchises.

Kasey McDonald (1:00:55) Yes, definitely.

Peter Schravemade (1:00:56) But and that's probably indicative of that. But then there were some that just shut up shop, said, Yeah, my time in real estate's done. Look, I've I've weathered all these changes, but these ones coming in, you know, it's a little bit too much. so yeah, inter interesting. But yeah, we'll find out Monday, Tuesday on that. But definitely on the totality side, I'm expecting and I think Tim Lawless actually said this, we're expecting much greater falls ahead. So

you know, prepare your businesses for that. That should be yeah the there are there are definitely things that you can do. a lot of them are going back to the basics and being consistent in ways that you probably haven't been for some time.

Kasey McDonald (1:01:35) Correct. Mm-hmm. Yeah, definitely. And as we said,

it's drawing out the cowboys and moving those on. And we're

Peter Schravemade (1:01:42) Mm.

Kasey McDonald (1:01:42) We're getting back to basics in real estate and those that really can understand how to negotiate, how to communicate, you know, how to market well. they're they're the ones that are going to be able to get through what, you know, what's occurring in our industry right now.

Peter Schravemade (1:01:57) Yep. This next topic is a bit of a follow up. so

Kasey McDonald (1:02:02) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:02:03) I mean I've turned it the Portal Wars, REA

Kasey McDonald (1:02:05) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:02:06) Group's results and one year of CoStar and Domain. So we're at that point. a year ago we had all heard that CoStar was going to acquire domain and it's it'd be interesting to look back, or we will look back. But the first part is the REA Group's financial year twenty six results were released on the sixth of August. So yesterday.

REA group, everyone will be happy to hear this. All property professionals will be happy to hear that the revenue has been up 7% to $1.79 billion.

Kasey McDonald (1:02:37) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:02:38) That's an eBid of 12%. core earnings up 15% and a dividend up 20% to $2.97. That's what they're paying out. stat net profit fell 22% to $509.

five hundred and nineteen million point three on impairment. So that's just the reparation once the numbers are in. So the number that matters for agents. So I think this is the part that will have all agents swearing at the other end of this podcast.

Kasey McDonald (1:03:08) Mm.

Peter Schravemade (1:03:10) Residential advertising revenue rose twelve percent to one point two nine billion. So let me rephrase that for you. In a year when national listings were flat and home values fell every month from the March peak

the rental advertising revenue still rose twelve percent. So everything else is falling. All bad news, but hang on. We're still gonna charge

Kasey McDonald (1:03:28) Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (1:03:32) Extra twelve percent in revenue.

Kasey McDonald (1:03:34) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:03:34) We've had that rise to one point two nine billion. controllable buy yield revenue per listing. So the amount of revenue they're getting per listing rose thirteen percent, built on seven percent premiere plus, which you will understand more than me, but that's one of the subscription models I have.

Plus add-ons, subscription increases, and depth penetration is what they're referring to. That what do you think depth penetration means there, Kasey?

Kasey McDonald (1:04:02) Hmm. De what's included in their subscription? Maybe? Is that what they're meeting with that? With depth penetration?

Peter Schravemade (1:04:07) Yeah, well it's an interesting one. That it's it yeah,

I wasn't really sure. So I know what subscription increases are, so they will be things

Kasey McDonald (1:04:15) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (1:04:15) That but it could be I suspect it refers to how much of each transaction they're getting. So that could be combining prop track, right? To

Kasey McDonald (1:04:26) Pro Yeah. Correct.

Peter Schravemade (1:04:28) To realtor to premiere plus.

So we're getting a little bit more money from the depth penetration of people using our products. But I might have a bit more of a look at that. Obviously, it came out yesterday and I'm in Fiji. and looking at the REA

Kasey McDonald (1:04:43) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (1:04:45) Group figures is not at the top of my priority list.

Kasey McDonald (1:04:47) No, absolutely not.

Peter Schravemade (1:04:49) But they gave financial twenty-seven year guidance. Listings they're

Kasey McDonald (1:04:53) Huh.

Peter Schravemade (1:04:53) Expecting to f flat to down, but they're expecting another eight percent premiere plus rot price rise flagged.

already targeting low double digit yield growth again. So despite what we you know we just went over where we thought the market was going, but

Kasey McDonald (1:05:08) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:05:09) Here's REA group saying, yep, we agree exactly with what you're saying. Listings are going to be down, flat to down, but we're expecting another eight percent increase in our Premier Plus price rise already flagged for the investors there. So what are you how what are your thoughts?

thirteen percent more revenue.

Kasey McDonald (1:05:30) You can probably now you can see the look on my face, but our

listeners cannot see the look on my face.

Peter Schravemade (1:05:37) That's good news, isn't it?

Kasey McDonald (1:05:40) Fantastic news for the industry. yeah, I guess look, you know, we always see, and we've been around for a long time, but we always see that REA every year do those price rises. I think what they've done differently is that I guess rolling everything in.

before

Peter Schravemade (1:05:58) Bundle.

Kasey McDonald (1:05:59) It used to kind of be adding it, now they've bundled everything and it's kind of like, let's take you to that top tier subscription and you're gonna get all of these things in you know, included instead of you kind of paying additional subscription fees. and they're doing that right to keep the agencies sticky into their ecosystem, good or bad, how you know, if that's kind of looking at it. But I guess, you know, what I always hear all of the time, which I'm sure you do as well, is that

the common feedback is, you know, why does REA do this? And every year there's a price rise and we hate them and there's all these things that people talk negatively about them and why do we need to do this? But yet we keep paying the fee, we keep doing what we're needing, you know, what they put in front of us, because we just have this fear of that if we make a change and we're not on that, then we're not going to achieve the outcome. And I just and I just disagree with that sentiment. I think whilst you might need to be on

Peter Schravemade (1:06:55) Feed driven. Yep.

Kasey McDonald (1:06:56) There, it's just a sphere.

of that if we're

Peter Schravemade (1:06:58) Yeah.

Kasey McDonald (1:06:58) Not, but why do you have to be the top tier? Why do you have to have, you know, you're there selling the home, right? So w does it matter if you're got a smaller size ad to a larger size ad, right? You know, so yeah, I just don't agree. That's, you know, 'cause the mentality some of with some of our agents about how they feel about this fearness of having to be on REA and B on a Premier Plus all of the time.

Peter Schravemade (1:07:25) Yeah, it's but it's pretty poor optics. So, REA earnings grew fifteen percent when there are

Kasey McDonald (1:07:30) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:07:31) Zero listing growth. Every dollar came from charging agents and vendors more per transaction. And the real story

Kasey McDonald (1:07:37) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (1:07:37) In that is I don't think the vendors know. I don't think they understand

That where the charge is coming from. I think a lot of the charge gets associated with the real estate agent because they are the person recommending this, you know. Let's go with this listing. what did I just pay? I just paid $1,700 to get a block of land up in a premiere on the REA group. Now I fully understand that's what the REA Group is charging. It was $1,800 actually. just disgusting that any portal would charge that. I know that, but I think most vendors don't. So every

They got came from charging agents and vendors more per transaction at roughly triple inflation in a falling market with another 8% rise already promised for next year. so agents can't walk away because the eyeballs are there. vendors

Kasey McDonald (1:08:27) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:08:28) Pay the depth product price rise inside of the marketing budget. So that's what's changed.

Is that I think all of the products have been rolled into. We're going to bundle this up as marketing, but there are other things in there and that would be worth looking at. H here's the kicker for me, Kasey, is I suspect right now, I've been working anecdotally around the industry. I haven't done a research report on it yet, but I think it I think it's worth doing one.

I think that eyeballs onto the REA website are down significantly with the rise of AI. I've gone looking for properties recently. I haven't used their portal once. I will use artificial intelligence to scrape all the portals. And in most cases, it will give me the real estate agents local portals or it'll direct me to domain or homely. It doesn't by default direct me to the REA group because they have crawlers blocking their site. Now

What percentage of the market do you think is using artificial intelligence in the search engine? Well, we've got stats out of the US that say that 60% over there are using AI in their search for property. We've got stats out of the UK suggesting your mid-40s, and that was 2025. So that was last year. That's a last year stat. Probably higher than 50% now. We would be naive to think that at least 40% of the Australian searching population are using artificial intelligence.

I think I think we could make an educated guess to say that listings, eyeballs on the REA Group website are down. And I notice I notice that their religious tendency of releasing this is how many eyeballs you get when you advertise on the REA Group website. Guess what? Hasn't been around for a little while. We haven't we haven't seen

Kasey McDonald (1:10:16) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:10:16) That released. I mean, is it is that just a is that

Kasey McDonald (1:10:19) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (1:10:19) Just a

Is it is it just co coincidence? But I'm actually turning around to most of the agents suggesting that for the first time ever we are seeing the consumer abandoned the REA Group website like I've never seen it before. that haven't released a fruitful artificial intelligence direction. We haven't seen one of those come from the REA group. We've seen some

fake, you know, like rapper type of hey, have a look at our chat GPT thing. None of them has worked. They're not getting they're not getting used. We're actually in a scenario right now where I wonder whether the savvy real estate agent is finding other ways in the area of artificial intelligence and engine optimization or Google SEO or search engine optimization. I'm I'm wondering whether the savvy operator is looking at that going there

There's

a real opportunity here because, you know, large portion of the market I think will be using AI and they're searched for property.

Kasey McDonald (1:11:21) Yeah, I guess it brings back to that, you know, my original statement, right? Is that agents have this fear of, okay, we've got the eyeballs there and we just have to be on there. And so,

Peter Schravemade (1:11:29) Yep.

Kasey McDonald (1:11:30) You know, we're then explaining that to our vendors is that's where we're going to find the buyers from. But you absolutely make a valid point. Is that really actually where the buyers are now looking? Now let's have

Peter Schravemade (1:11:41) Mm.

Kasey McDonald (1:11:41) A look at who are our buyers coming into the market. You know, we don't have

And there probably is maybe still some baby boomers out there that are that are looking to buy, maybe. but we're looking now at this younger gen generation and the way in which they use technology, AI, and the tools that are available to them is so completely different, right?

Peter Schravemade (1:12:07) Yeah, yep.

Kasey McDonald (1:12:08) Like your kids, I mean, you're very, very au fay with it, Pete. Certainly far more than me. and that's because you

You work in that world all of the time, right? So, but my stepchildren laugh at my husband and I because we'll go to do certain things on our phone and they look at us and go, You're joking, right? You just do this and it gets you to there. and we're

Peter Schravemade (1:12:28) Yeah.

Kasey McDonald (1:12:28) Doing it our old way in the way we know how to do it, right? So I guess every generation now is learning different ways and the way in which they can get the information surface to them faster. So I think you're right. you know, we do we do it. I've did it, I did it for

What where should we go when we're traveling to Japan in Christmas? And, you know, what should we be packing and you know, what are the best locations and how should we travel there? And Chat and Claude gave me very similar things. but they gave me my full itinerary, where we should go, what train we get on, what time, what number. and

Peter Schravemade (1:13:02) Mm. Yep.

Kasey McDonald (1:13:04) I did not go to any other site to do that other than AI.

Peter Schravemade (1:13:09) Yep. And I've done similar things in the in the home search area. I actually think that the property investment area has fully abandoned those sites. they may use them to reference and look at individual properties, but I don't think any of the search is going on in there. it can't. the they're set up really poorly for property investors to look at. Not that there are many in the market at the moment, but now it's even more important to try and find that jewel in the rough and do it faster.

And so, you know, I will rely on things like H tag, which you may have heard of, is a is a

Kasey McDonald (1:13:41) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:13:43) New d data player, has a lot of short term rental stats and things like that. I'm getting way better results out of out of using that over, let's say, a prop track or an RP data, when I'm looking for a house. And

the artificial intelligence search engines are actually listing like here's what I want, here's the specs. I would like it positively geared. Yeah, that's pretty hard to find, right? Or I don't have to

Kasey McDonald (1:14:05) Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (1:14:07) Go and look at all those listings anymore. It'll suck up the ones that it thinks are and it'll drop them into a list for me and I can just click through them. And so they're still getting hits on those individual clicks. They're all y you know what? They would know. They will know because

They're coming directly like they have a UTM which is like a tracking mechanism and it will be telling them you're getting a lot of your search engine. it would be interesting if they made that public, but look also embarrassing. I think I think we're not gonna see that for some time, but it would be actually great. and maybe this is something for my y you know, my part-time gig at Proptech Collab is to go after the consumer and see how many of them

I just ask a simple question, are you using artificial

Kasey McDonald (1:14:54) Mm.

Peter Schravemade (1:14:54) Intelligence in your in your property search? Because I think you're gonna find the answer to that is quite alarming and one that real estate agents are not keeping up with. But however, on

Kasey McDonald (1:15:03) Yeah, definitely.

Peter Schravemade (1:15:04) The on the back of those findings, you know, it's mo one thing I'd urge real estate agents is just to be savvy with your money. Just don't keep on pouring it to the dominant because they're there.

Kasey McDonald (1:15:17) Yes.

Peter Schravemade (1:15:17) Have a think about where your spend is going.

Because if you just leave it to the dominant portal, you will spend more every single time. and there are agents out there who are doing quite well without the use of REA at all.

Kasey McDonald (1:15:30) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:15:30) So you know, there is a formula and there is a way to it. let's move on, because the part B to this

Kasey McDonald (1:15:35) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (1:15:36) Is we've got a one-year checkup on CoStar having bought domain. Now I've got to admit,

Kasey McDonald (1:15:40) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:15:40) I had lots of hope for this. If you

Kasey McDonald (1:15:44) Yes,

Peter Schravemade (1:15:44) Look at the backstory

CoStar is the biggest commercial portal in the world, really owns a lot of the commercial entity over in the US. They also started and go this is going back five or six years ago. They acquired homes.com after an unsuccessful bid at realtor.com. So Zillow number one, realtor.com

Kasey McDonald (1:16:03) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:16:04) Number two. Holmes was a pretty distant number three. And if you ever follow the guy, Mike Delpredi, you'll see he releases articles. Homes.com

Which is owned by CoStar, had a crack at getting to that number two position in the US. I think they'd spent upwards of 300 million dollars and they hadn't moved more than one and a half percentage points towards that second position. And I really felt as though I have nothing to back this up. I felt as though CoStar acquired domain to sync that up with homes.com to do a bit of damage to realtor.com's sister organization, which is real estate.

dot com dot au there's a lot of portables I've just mentioned so get you know try and get your height get your head around that

Kasey McDonald (1:16:47) Yes. Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (1:16:50) But I had really felt that if CoStar came in owning domain and all it ha all it would have to do is erode the erode the value, erode the profitability of realestate.com.au offer stuff for free that would do so much damage to realestate.com.au and in turn possibly realtor.com.

But it didn't happen. And a large counterpoint for that was straight after their acquisition of domain, which was a record acquisition, the CEO Andy Florence was slapped down by his investment board saying you've you've well they called it feckless spending. Roughly five billion dollars spent on residential for eighty million of revenue.

Now I'm not a mathematician, but

Kasey McDonald (1:17:43) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:17:43) Kasey, if I said to you I've spent five billion of your money and I've got your eighty mi it's okay, I've got your eighty million back in revenue, I don't I don't think you'd be very, very happy about that. That's a lot of Gucci watches that you could have bought for that.

Kasey McDonald (1:17:56) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (1:17:59) Think of the heels. But that

Kasey McDonald (1:17:59) Yeah. I'm not too sure you'd work you'd continue working for me if that's the kind of outcome you're going to get

me if I say, Can you buy this to ensure we make money? yeah. Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (1:18:10) But that was what happened. That was that was effectively

what happened. So e ever since then, Andy Florence, by the way, Andy Florence is like a he's he's like the kind of guy you'd describe as bull in a china shop. He will just break it all and then he's actually quite good. I've like I got a lot of respect for him. But he's gone quiet. totally not yeah, totally not what he I thought he would. he has come out and said homes.com investment

is delivering exactly what it we said it would. So he can't have gone into this going, We're gonna make a lot of money. This would have to be a ten year play at the residential in the US and other areas to try and get some profitability. So co

Kasey McDonald (1:18:52) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (1:18:53) CoStar's residential business has just po posted its first adjusted EBITDA positive quarter on the back of double digit revenue growth a year after acqu acquiring domain. So that is proof that here that's his Florence's proof.

point against the activist on his shareboard. And Domain is a big part of why the residential line finally turned. So look, I think I think it's positive for Domain. What are you what are your thoughts? You we're not seeing anything on the front line that would lead us to believe that they're doing any real damage to the REA group, right?

Kasey McDonald (1:19:28) No, I don't think there's definitely that's kind of appearing on the front line. you know, obviously I saw, you know, about six months ago, or maybe even earlier than that, where they made a decision to look to sell off some of the assets that they had as a part of you know, some of their tools, I guess. like engage similar to real tear, you know, some of those. I don't know where the correct, yeah.

Peter Schravemade (1:19:51) That's here in here in Australia, right? Yeah. Domain, yep.

Kasey McDonald (1:19:54) I correct, yeah, through domain. So some of those tools.

And I guess they looked at, you know, were those tools being used, how many subscribers, what kind of income was coming from those? And I and I am assuming they made some of that decision, whether or not they've they've been able to sell them or not, but to then kind of launch into that new initiative with Mataport 3D, right? With the tours,

Peter Schravemade (1:20:16) Mm.

Kasey McDonald (1:20:17) Where they're kind of promoting the open home always open. Buyers can just walk through online at any time. so

I don't know if that's been you know, has seen, you know, that pro positive, I guess, profit improvement there for

Peter Schravemade (1:20:32) Mm.

Kasey McDonald (1:20:33) Them through domain. But I definitely haven't seen it. Probably maybe how we all were hoping it would happen that they would kind of come in and shake REA a little. I haven't I haven't seen that yet. However,

Peter Schravemade (1:20:43) Yeah, yep. Yep.

Kasey McDonald (1:20:47) I do think that from what I am seeing, they're they're doing

good things. I think they're far more reasonably priced. I think they're fairer in how they do that, is certainly for the from the consumer sense. you know, from what I hear in the market. But, you know, they're not as prominent within Queensland. They certainly have their pockets of market share and loyalty. But I just don't think that they've done it to what we were all expecting in the industry that we were hoping that they would do.

Peter Schravemade (1:21:18) Yeah. I think I think yeah, and for the listeners who don't know, CoStar purchased Matterport. So they're the largest three sixty

Kasey McDonald (1:21:26) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:21:27) Provider in the world. Arguably the best. I always had issues with their quality and the speed of which the portal went, but consistently it's pretty hard to argue ab against the number one being used. I still think today I can pick up a decent camera and do a better tour

than a Mataport 360 home tour and the cost of Mataport is like incrementally 40 times higher than what I could do one with myself. But that's me. Your average agent doesn't have that time. So they will run out and they will get an operator. And I think it costs about 400 to 500 bucks to do a Mataport 360 to a of a standard house. When they announced that

that they're no longer appearing. We're not allowing any Mataport tours on realestate.com.au websites. Realestate.com.au had to go out and purchase this 360 provider and they purchased a Canadian company called Planetar, I think it is. It's a little no on one. Not bad in tech, but it's it's basically, you know, they can put on a brave face and say we were intending to do it for years. But it's absolute garbage. there's no way that they would have seen that coming. And so

realestate.com.a you got you got caught on the hop. So what that means for consumers is if you are trying to put a 360 tour on there, you can't use Mataport to put it on the realestate.com.a you website, you have to use another provider. So I don't I don't know what that's done to Mataport. That would be very interesting around Australia and how

Kasey McDonald (1:22:53) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (1:22:53) That's how that's delivered there. But there's been some shots fired, I guess. That's my long way of saying that. But I'm with you. I haven't seen anything that would lead us to believe that

realestate.com. you are hurting in any significant way and that

Kasey McDonald (1:23:10) No.

Peter Schravemade (1:23:10) End of financial year statement backs up that they're they're probably not. we should probably leave that conversation and keep moving.

Kasey McDonald (1:23:19) Absolutely.

Peter Schravemade (1:23:21) Look we've got one here are off market sales becoming too common.

Kasey McDonald (1:23:26) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:23:27) Do you know what this story is about? Did you get a chance to read it?

Kasey McDonald (1:23:30) Yeah. the online discussion questions, it was around whether or not there's now too many properties are selling off market. So through the agency

Peter Schravemade (1:23:39) Off market. Yeah.

Kasey McDonald (1:23:40) Data databases, right? So they're not and I guess it kind of comes back to an earlier

Peter Schravemade (1:23:43) And to just to correct that.

Kasey McDonald (1:23:45) Point, they're not even reaching the portals, right? They're looking, yeah.

Peter Schravemade (1:23:47) Yeah, to correct that, they

just in terminology, they're not off market, even though that's what we call They're off portal. Yeah, they're off portal, right? So they're

Kasey McDonald (1:23:54) Call it correct. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:23:57) Not being advertised on your major portal, but just for the listeners out here who don't know anything, you know, that you're seeing online should have an appointment act signed for it. So technically when that signature hits the page and is executed.

It's on market. Even if even if they haven't put it on a for portal. So yeah, that

Kasey McDonald (1:24:15) Yes. Correct. Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (1:24:18) Off portal is what they're meaning sell. Are off portal sales becoming too common? And y sorry, I interrupted you. Your thoughts on that?

Kasey McDonald (1:24:24) Yes. No,

that's okay. Yeah, I was just I think you know, this I think they the numbers came out and it said 20% nationally. So that's about a hundred thousand a year now sell without the need to go to Portal. so it's it's interesting,

Peter Schravemade (1:24:42) Hm. Well we talked about this a second ago, didn't we?

Kasey McDonald (1:24:45) Right? Yeah, right. Like about how the listing numbers, the eyeballs are down.

That you know, with there's been no growth in those EC numbers getting onto REA Prop Track, a part of the R REA group analyzed that kind of, I guess, those numbers and said around 4.3% versus their comparable markets of what actually went to their site has widened. so it's now gone from 4.3 to 6%. So it's actually increased. So it is the statistics are showing that.

More and more agencies are working with their vendors and looking at we have got a database of already qualified buyers. We know these buyers are looking for these particular properties. And let's leverage that before we potentially need to go and spend XY money on getting to a portal. So, yes, I think it is becoming more increasingly common. The question I've got for you, Pete, though, is do you think that's a

great way that our industry should be moving forward.

Peter Schravemade (1:25:50) No, I don't, but I think I think this is the REA group's fault. Not to put it in their in their bundled straight up. But I you know, I'm

Kasey McDonald (1:25:58) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:25:58) Well aware there's a really prevalent practice at the moment. Like let's say you get a lot of houses for sale in the same area. You we've all been to a subdivision where we see the houses are similar in nature. what I've seen a lot of agents doing to avoid spending ridiculous fees on REA portal listings.

is leaving a particular house up that is similar to other ones that they are listing. That lift it up on that premium subscription or whatever it is and a are they are just directing people who have come from inquiry on property one to property two, three, four, five and six. I'm seeing that in both rental, and in

Sales like so sorry we don't have that one anymore. I know you've made an inquiry on four five six Smith Street, but we've got a really similar one on four five seven Smith Street, which is in

Kasey McDonald (1:26:49) Mm.

Peter Schravemade (1:26:50) The same subdivision. Here are the differences between them, and they're directing from one to the other. And the only reason I see a lot of that happening is not because the agent wants to, or they haven't done the marketing on the other portal, or they're being lazy. They don't want, you know, they're trying to stop vendors paying.

you know, i in it two percent of their marketing fees. We just heard how much of the REA group, you know, they've increased per property.

Kasey McDonald (1:27:17) Mm.

Peter Schravemade (1:27:18) I believe the agents are trying to do the right thing by the vendors in still marketing the property but not having to pay there's so many people, like even in the marketing of a property that I have listed, not the one that I've just spoken about, where they said to me, here is what we're going to do before we put it on the REA Group website because they're quite conscious

of how much of a whack that is to my hip pocket every time it goes on the website. So it there are very, very few agencies who don't have a strategy for before the REA group. And don't forget, the REA group know that. This is why they tried to buy that dynamic methods forms provider

Kasey McDonald (1:27:57) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:27:58) Is because they wanted to know as soon as something is listed. If you were ever going to go out and disrupt the REA group, the distance between

The listing being signed and it getting up on the REA group, that's your that's your opportunity. That's where they have very little visibility until a sale where they can ask how much you know if you sold that. I think they've got some thing for agents at the moment where if you don't disclose what you sold the property for, you don't get higher in the listings. So they I don't know, don't quote me on that. But yeah, if you if you know what that is, send me a message if you're listening to this. I've had like

twenty messages on people correcting me on stuff on here. So I don't know what that is, but I know that you're required to disclose your sale to the REA

group

Kasey McDonald (1:28:41) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (1:28:41) If you're part of this it's some kind of premier listing or something. But yeah, are they becoming too common? No, no, they're not common enough, in my opinion.

Kasey McDonald (1:28:50) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:28:52) I personally don't like them. I think we need a marketplace where it's free to start off with and we put our properties up online and people get eyeballs, but

I will defend the REA group's position in the market. They are the number one. They're deservedly the number one. They built it to be the best in the industry. I'm well aware that they're losing their luster at the moment and more than that, losing the consumer. I think that's quite obvious, but I think this is a subject of agents and vendors being held over the barrel to list something on a on a public portal at an unrealistic price. you know, in comparison

What does it cost me in Vegas? Five hundred dollars a year to be a part of the Nevada Realtors Association, which gives me access to over sixty-five portals for free. Let that one sink in for three seconds. That's that's exactly what

Kasey McDonald (1:29:43) Yeah. Absolutely.

Peter Schravemade (1:29:45) That's exactly why we're in this scenario. That's exactly why we're here. what do you think?

Kasey McDonald (1:29:47) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Yeah, I think you know, you're right in saying it's, you know, it depends on obviously the vendor's goals as well, right? So each agent is going to be working through, and some just unfortunately can't afford the amount that's being charged across the marketing campaigns. And everyone is in a different position at different times. so I think the strategy has a place.

And it but in the way in which it's used for what goal are we actually trying to achieve. But if we were shifting our entire strategy, I feel like that if everything then stopped maybe going to the portal, then you there could be a transparency issue that might start being compromised. We could have buyers then starting to more come to the market of we're we're not seeing these. How do we? We have never been to an open home before. So those tenants, for

Peter Schravemade (1:30:42) Mm.

Kasey McDonald (1:30:43) Example, who are looking to buy and then they are

Consistently missing out because they just don't ever see these properties come to market. We then

Peter Schravemade (1:30:50) Yeah.

Kasey McDonald (1:30:51) Potentially will face this issue of government coming in and bringing some kind of legislation about how much we need to do it. So yeah, I think they, I think they do have a place, but I think it depends on what is the vendor's goals, what outcome are we trying to achieve. And yes, you might

Peter Schravemade (1:31:09) Mm.

Kasey McDonald (1:31:09) Have a buyer who was at 456 Smith Street and now four, five, seven.

call you and say, hey, what did you get? I'm thinking about selling. And you go, well, I've got five buyers who are ready to go. I don't see a problem in that. But, you know, I think it's a, you know, we just have to make sure that we're also being transparent.

Peter Schravemade (1:31:30) Yeah, I th I think it's more prevalent too in rentals. I think it's hugely prevalent where

Kasey McDonald (1:31:33) Mm-hmm. Yeah, definitely.

Peter Schravemade (1:31:36) Yeah, so that stat's not even on there. I think you will find there are a lot of agencies out there who leave dummy listings up that are similar to what they could be getting and they funnel people through to whatever else and fair play to them. I that makes it bad from the consumer point, I think. But yes. Let's move on. Yeah, yeah.

Kasey McDonald (1:31:55) Yeah, definitely. Well we'll move on. Yeah, definitely.

You did you also did a really great interview this week with Ellis Taylor of Real Time

Peter Schravemade (1:32:06) Mm.

Kasey McDonald (1:32:06) Australia. And you launched that yesterday, actually. we did it as a as an early addition to the podcast. and so you know, kind of talk me through it. Give me a few of the tips of what our listeners are going to hear, and then we can get straight into that.

Maybe share another snippet of that interview or repost that for those that didn't get a chance to listen yesterday.

Peter Schravemade (1:32:28) Yeah, well it's it's it's up there so you can go and have a listen. It's actually Alice and Jackie.

Kasey McDonald (1:32:33) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:32:33) Alice and Jackie Barnes. So Jackie Barnes released a women in real estate and

Kasey McDonald (1:32:38) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:32:39) This is the crux of the conversation, she wro r released a report at the RERQ Lyft conference. That one was on the stage, Jackie was first, and Alice was second. And Jackie was talking about where women in real estate are likely to leave real estate. And Alice,

Kasey McDonald (1:32:54) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:32:55) Who came up immediately after, said who is a reporter.

Recruitment expert across Australia, really good. He came up and said immediately into the microphone, thank you for that, because we that's exactly where we're picking them up. And so this conversation was about a recruiter's playbook in taking not just women but salespersons from the real estate talent pool.

and seeking them out for other jobs. So Alice's real background lies in finding in this instance, well normally people of a technical nature, so prop property technology or technology in general, but he works for the Adalassian, Canva, Google, those kind of providers. And he is finding that real estate agents or people in the real estate property profession at a certain age are really ripe for the picking to drop them in and they flourish very well.

In a sales association, in a sales type of role for these.

Kasey McDonald (1:33:53) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:33:54) So very interesting conversation. Listen to what Jackie says about the industry problem. Listen to what Ellis says about rating and exploiting the industry problem. And as somebody who has pivoted from real estate sales, real estate operations to property technology myself.

there was a lot that they were talking about in there that actually rammed home to me. This is exactly why I'm in this area. You're you're also a byproduct of that. Didn't happen in the time frame that they're talking about. Neither of us did. but well worth well worth a look at that conversation. And if you want to have a look at that, that's on before the weekend dot com. If you go to our episodes, it's labelled as a quick bite. You should be able to find it in there. but we might move on. Yeah.

Kasey McDonald (1:34:37) Mm-hmm. Yeah, fantastic. We'll pop an extra link in. We'll pop an extra

link in just so everyone can draw back to that. But yeah, let's let's move on to our next piece. strata special levies are in the spotlight with many,

Peter Schravemade (1:34:52) Yeah, talk me through this.

Kasey McDonald (1:34:53) Many Sydney owners now getting hit with remediation bills. and they're coming at

Cost of like $52,000 of owners now having to come up and add interest onto that, right?

Peter Schravemade (1:35:09) Mm-hmm.

Kasey McDonald (1:35:09) Where they're having to then pay for particular works to get done on those buildings. but I guess there's probably been a bit of a lack of initial knowledge around how much of that, or when should we have known about this prior? you know.

Can I pay it up front? Can I not? Am I expected to? Do I pay it extra in my levies? And so, you know, what really came out of, I guess, what I read within the letter is that this one particular owner, hers was $52,000 share. It was then $12,000 of interest. And they had to go to a vote with the strata because of course everyone's going, Well, how do we afford this? and it was setting aside now.

Each fortnight on top of her mortgage to pay additional costs for these remediation works to get done. there's all it's not just out of Sydney, it's actually coming out of Melbourne as well, where they've basically kind of gone, well, here's the works, and this just needs to be done. And for us to actually do the work, you now need to pay these bills up front. So that's a lot of money for

Peter Schravemade (1:36:19) Mm.

Kasey McDonald (1:36:20) Owners to be coming up with all in one go. What's your take on it, Pete?

Peter Schravemade (1:36:25) Look, yeah, I feel for the owners, but I think it is a subject of living in a space that has shared facilities. then that might

Kasey McDonald (1:36:34) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:36:35) Be a shared wall. You know, if you're in a two hundred strong apartment with a pool with common areas, there is a good chance I look I've I have a apartment on the Gold Coast

And for years it had a leaky pool, which was the bane of my existence. Rather than fix it the first time properly and spend a little bit of more money, we had stupid efforts to like let's recoke the pool, which cost X amount of dollars and

all of them were from the start, I was in team fix the pool because I've seen leaky pools before. you know, my experience says if you don't spend the money on fixing them up front, you're going to have heftier patchwork bills before you pay and that was exactly what happened. But what happens when you get to a strata body corporate scenario is that you're you have one vote in X amount.

And I think a lot of this comes in the buying process. A lot of the better education could be you know, to be honest, if you're purchasing for the first time in a in a strata title scenario, I would encourage you to use a professional to purchase.

Because they're gonna identify things that you just won't know, like how many are in the body corporate, what's your voting right. there are other things you can do. So during the conveyance process, you can do searches for the community title scheme, all the meetings that have happened up to their that particular point. You can see,

Kasey McDonald (1:38:05) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:38:05) Like they've gone and gotten six quotes on water ingress coming from above. A lot of people don't do those searches through the conveyancer because they think they are extra add ons through the process. But I

wouldn't be purchasing in a community title scheme or a let's call it a multifamily for the Americans listening or a unit or apartment block until you've done those searches because you just don't know what's going on with the buildings and you can be stung like my latest strata title built had

I was contributing, it was only five hundred dollars really, but I was contributing to the landscaping out of the back of units that I'm not that aren't even mine. but these are can these are shared facilities. So there's a couple of things. What are your shared

Kasey McDonald (1:38:53) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:38:54) Facilities? What's the upkeep on that?

That's what you should be looking at. The second one is what state are they in? there's something called a sinking fund, you'd be well familiar with, right, Kasey. Where

Kasey McDonald (1:39:05) Huh. Yes, yes.

Peter Schravemade (1:39:06) This is this is a pool of money. Generally, at the start of any kind of build, the sinking fund has a healthy amount of money in it. These are for things that are ongoing. The body corporate can spend that money. And every year you make a contribution to the administrative fund, which is the operational fund of the body corporate, and you make a contribution.

contribution

to the sinking fund, which is the f the

Kasey McDonald (1:39:28) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:39:29) Rainy day fund. What if something happens, like a pool leak or whatever? Now, if you if you're walking into a stratatal scenario where there's nothing in the sinking fund, you're in a bit of trouble, you know? but then there are catastrophic things that you can't account for. even this is not limited to Australia in America at the moment. They're finding that

A lot of the multifamily as they call them or apartment complexes after a certain type have never had engineering or structural defecting done on them or rectification works and as a result of one collapsing in Florida and many people losing their lives, all of a sudden they're getting these defect notices through and they are hectic. They are like they make these numbers that we're looking at really stupid. They're asking them for like half a million dollars per

per entity. Now we have more stringent building corporation laws here, but I've gotta say, I think a lot of the disappointment comes because they didn't know something about the property

Kasey McDonald (1:40:27) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:40:28) That they were buying at the start. And it's better education up front. you know what? If you go to buy an apartment and you're using artificial intelligence and you put a link in and you ask chat or Claude or Gemini what are the

problems I might see with this, the first thing they tell you is to start looking at the body corporate. Even before the unit. So you know, we were just talking about AI searches before. I feel bad for people caught in this scenario, but we

Kasey McDonald (1:40:59) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:40:59) Operate in Australia under a Latin term called caveat emptor, which means buyer beware. And you know, this is a property that doesn't come with a warranty, or if it comes with a warranty, that's a builder's obligation.

so you really gotta do your research before you get into these body corporate scenarios that it's not just happy days we're gonna go in, everything will be hunky dory.

Kasey McDonald (1:41:23) Yeah, definitely. Yeah, look, you know, and I think it's really important as a part of this as well. Check out those c clauses and terms within the building insurance as well. What actually can be covered? Is that a part of insurance? Can we just do an insurance claim to then get those repairs done? Or is it the fact that no, we all do need to come up with additional funds within that community title? So yeah, I think

For those out there who are listening who may be buyers and looking to get into the market and the unit market, make sure you definitely do your research here because you don't want to get in and in a few years' time get slogged with an extra $50,000 bill and expected to pay that all up front to get any additional works done. Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (1:42:06) Hm. Yep, agreed.

Kasey McDonald (1:42:07) Last story of the day. The block is back, Pete. The block is back.

Peter Schravemade (1:42:15) I do. I know you are.

Kasey McDonald (1:42:15) I'm excited. You know why? Because

I get to sit there and I get to, you know, look, whatever. I don't really care about the drama and all that sort of stuff that goes on with it. For me, I typically watch it on the Sunday night once the work's been done for each of the rooms because then I get excited and I get all creative and all of these ideas about what I could do in my own house, including, yeah, let's do a bathroom renovation and I'll just swap that vanity with this vanity and I get all these

Eyeball rolls from my husband looking at me of like,

Peter Schravemade (1:42:45) Yeah.

Kasey McDonald (1:42:46) Just shush up, you just, you know. but the kids love it too on a Sunday night when they're with us and we sit down and we have a look at the color schemes and stuff. But anyway, I enjoy it from that sense, but I kind of get the sense that you don't like it at all.

Peter Schravemade (1:43:02) No, I don't I don't I ca I n

Kasey McDonald (1:43:04) Ha.

Peter Schravemade (1:43:05) I understand I understand why you do. I think you can look at a magazine as well. but

Kasey McDonald (1:43:12) Come

on. It's far better on TV watching, you know, the great colour schemes and maybe how it's come together. But yes, go on.

Peter Schravemade (1:43:18) Yeah, well

there's a there's a couple of things. So firstly I don't like the way it portrays the br block operates under this false economy that you can buy a house, renovate it and sell it at a profit. and it ignores basic stuff like overcapitalization, which is when you buy a house, you know, this used to happen when I was I was selling houses. There'd be two houses next to each other. They were both

bought purchased at the same time, house A would spend X amount of dollars, let's say $200,000 on a renovation. House B would spend nothing. Maybe they'd give it a coat of paint, but very little. we'd go to sell both of those and they'd both sell for the same price. So House A, who'd done all of this r renovation, would not actually get more or better capital yield than House B. And that's because like the block takes our

a renovation approach, like we need to renovate everything or build everything from scratch, whatever it is, we need to do every room in the house. But most real estate agents when they're walking through a property will actually say to you, you know what? We could probably achieve the same result for you here by giving it a coat of paint on the outside. Because we know because we're selling these. And it's from it's from the perspective that I think the block makes a lot of Australians dumber about property

And exacerbate some big things. So you know, how many of the 27 block homes resold since the show began made a profit? Well, you're you're not gonna like the answer to that. I think I think there's like single figure digits. the standout would be the guy, Adrian Portality.

Kasey McDonald (1:45:06) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (1:45:06) You've seen him a few cases. He bought five of the Philip Island houses.

and then quit as a buyer, he sold them when he resold them, he'd paid four point three million. he made a one million dollar loss. Like Adrian Portelli is just doing it for the eyeballs that are hitting him. the

Kasey McDonald (1:45:23) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:45:23) Auction results were never market results. So when they do sell at auction, it's not reflective of the market that's out there. and then yeah, I think it's the overc capitalization problem. Block houses are always over capitalized. A four million dollar spec fit outs

in locations like Dalesford, Phillips Is Phillip Island, Gisborne. Like

Kasey McDonald (1:45:44) Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:45:45) If you're spending just if you're out there and you're listening to me and you live in those areas and you're spending four million dollars on a renovation in there, you're doing it wrong. So that's that's the perspective. It's not any of the like I realise it's a T V show and they have to make drama from it. But I don't I don't really support anything that makes the general population in Australia dumber when it comes to property.

Kasey McDonald (1:46:08) Don't you just like how they might come up with different ideas? That's what I think kind of, if I can pull a positive from it, it's about maybe how we can think about why.

Peter Schravemade (1:46:14) Well I do, d but I sa I suggested it's cheaper and it's cheaper for you to buy a magazine, Kasey. Like I don't I don't I don't wanna sound like he your

husband but look, you know the best part about the story that you've told me

Kasey McDonald (1:46:25) I think I think Yeah. Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (1:46:27) So far is that you're watching it with your kids. That's the best part. and that's not to be ignored. the block is a great opportunity to teach our children about what you would do and what you wouldn't do, and these are conversation starters.

If it's something that they're interested in is the unheralded part of what we're talking about here is that you're watching it with your family. I think that's brilliant. it's

Kasey McDonald (1:46:51) Yeah.

Peter Schravemade (1:46:51) It's not for the renovation opportunities. I get it, I understand it.

Kasey McDonald (1:46:55) No I

Peter Schravemade (1:46:56) But y you know, you know what? Like just having your having that conversation with your kids going, What did he d do wrong here? What do you think he did wrong? Or w how did they how did they not make their money back? my god, they you know, they couldn't pull eleven million out of Dalesford.

Kasey McDonald (1:47:10) Yeah.

But like if we talk about, you know, hey, do you like that vanity? Like, do you think that

Peter Schravemade (1:47:15) Yeah.

Kasey McDonald (1:47:15) Would look cool in your bathroom in the house? Or what did you think of that color scheme? And so we sort of ta start talking about stuff. But then kind of back to the AI conversation. Do you know what we then do? Take a photo of the bathroom, put it into AI and say,

Peter Schravemade (1:47:28) Yeah.

Kasey McDonald (1:47:28) Can you then do this color scheme, put that style of vanity on and let's do a picture of what it might look like. So the kids then

Peter Schravemade (1:47:34) Mm.

Kasey McDonald (1:47:34) Kind of do that and get a bit involved in what it could look like. So I think, you know, from

From that perspective, you know, I guess there's some learnings there. But I do want to say that we shouldn't expect the bathroom renovation or the kitchen to all be done in 48 hours. And I guess that's probably the negative piece, right? I think there are some pod positives that can come out of that show. but the negative is that we can't expect that if we were doing any type of renovation, that it's all going to be finished in a couple of days.

Peter Schravemade (1:48:07) Yeah, understood. I have questioned your judgment on several things, but watching the block is not the not the highlight of that. So I'll I'll let that one slide just for today. Hey, look, we're we're out of time. but

Kasey McDonald (1:48:20) Yeah, yeah. Absolutely.

Peter Schravemade (1:48:25) The weak stories obviously share a common thread. trust, we've hit it a few times before.

Kasey McDonald (1:48:29) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Peter Schravemade (1:48:32) Tenants trusting what happens to footage of their homes, landlords trusting the rules won't change under them. buyers trusting that the market they can see is the whole market, opponent owners, sorry, apartment owners trusting the levy notice in their inbox is a be is one. And an industry trusting that the platforms it pays are working for it, not just monetizing it. So every one of these stories is asking whether that trust has been earned. Kasey, what's your final word?

Kasey McDonald (1:49:00) Yeah, I think we've covered a lot today, Pete. so my final word today, I guess, in relating to that is being diligent, right? It's doing our research. It's not just taking on every, you know, provider. It's making sure it's what you need in your business. It's talking through with your landlords and your tenants, right? It's building that relationship. guys, that's the industry that we're in. We're in a people

Peter Schravemade (1:49:27) Mm.

Kasey McDonald (1:49:27) Industry and the product that we

rent and or sell is a home. And so let's just not forget that. Let's take it back to human connection and then the trust is going to come back. So that's my final word on before the weekend today.

Peter Schravemade (1:49:44) Well said, if you're out there happy hunting for the weekend, selling, leasing, whatever it is that you're doing, putting your open friend submission signs up. It's been great to have you on the podcast. If you're after anything, you can subscribe at before the weekend dot com. You can find all of our episodes there. But until next week, it's it's Cheerio from me in beautiful Fiji. Good to see you again, Kasey, and we'll catch

Kasey McDonald (1:50:07) Yes.

Peter Schravemade (1:50:07) You all in one week from now.

Kasey McDonald (1:50:10) Yes, we'll see you then. Have a fantastic weekend.