Technology is ever-evolving, and it's transforming the real estate industry. Not only are today's technological advancements arming real estate professionals with new tools and applications to better their business and the service they provide clients, but technology is also generating volumes of information about how people approach and conduct real estate transactions.
[IMAGE]To help Realtors understand and interpret these trends, the ""National Association of Realtors"":http://www.realtor.org (NAR) hired Todd Carpenter to fill the new position of managing director of data analytics. Carpenter was most recently senior manager of industry engagement at ""Trulia.com"":http://www.trulia.com and was NAR's director of digital engagement earlier in his career.
""I am very excited to be returning to NAR, and to be a part of this groundbreaking initiative,"" Carpenter said. ""NAR has access to an enormous amount of data, and I'm going to be looking at how we can use that data to help our organization, our brokers, and our members make better business decisions that, in turn, help ... consumers.""
[COLUMN_BREAK]NAR is also creating a data scientist position; this person, yet to be hired, will report to Carpenter. Together, the two newly conceived positions will form a new predictive analytics group.
This group will work closely with the trade organization's ""Center for Realtor Technology"":http://www.crt.realtors.org/ research division and other internal groups to create analytics from NAR data and a variety of other sources. Beyond NAR's data sets, Carpenter will also be responsible for acquiring and licensing data from other sources to achieve the group's goals.
""Predictive analytics is NAR's approach to the often misunderstood but intriguing area known as ‘Big Data,'"" said Mark Lesswing, NAR's chief technology officer and SVP. ""Predictive analytics supports business by identifying, with some certainty, upcoming shifts in priorities. Keeping in front of these changes will allow us to provide the value that Realtors expect from NAR.""
The new NAR predictive analytics group will examine and analyze member and customer trends from a variety of data sets to better inform business planning and help the association develop services and resources that provide value to its membership, NAR explained. The objective, the trade group says, is to give Realtors insights into ways they can better meet the needs of their clients and customers.
Carpenter will be speaking about the latest trends in the area of predictive analytics at the Emerging Business Technology Forum during this month's ""Realtors Conference and Expo"":http://www.realtor.org/convention.nsf/ in San Francisco on November 9.