As an old real estate educator, I believe this is very exciting and a great move, looking to the future, for NAR, for RealX and for my old friend, Luke Glass.
Why? Because the Future of Real Estate, in my opinion, includes continuing to unbundle the "Bundle of Rights," which is the traditional definition of ownership.
Lesson One in all of the Real Estate Principles courses I have taught over the last 40 years begins first with defining property (everything subject to ownership) and then defining ownership as a "Bundle of Rights."
But what are some of those rights? Historically, the right to use, possess, encumber, rent, dispose of, to the exclusion of others.
Part of ownership and rights of real property include Mineral Oil and Gas rights, Timber rights, Air Space rights, and even some rights we may not have thought of yet.
Technology is taking the friction out of transactions of all types and allowing for new ways to distribute rights contained within that "bundle."
Think about this...we have always been able to rent property we own to others, but Air B&B made renting property for very short periods of time possible, thus increasing the revenue producing value of a home.
Alex Rampell, a General Partner of the venture capital firm Andreesen Horowitz speaks of something called "Dynamic Yield Maximization of an Otherwise Static Asset” (Video: When Software Eats The World). Increasing the revenue opportunities and the utility value of real property, made possible because of the ease of transacting, made possible by technology
About 6 months ago I ran into Luke at an industry event. I have known Luke since 2008 when he was running Listhub and I was running Point2. We were friendly competitors in the race for MLS data and data syndication and we sold those companies around the same time. Listhub went to REALTOR dot com and Point2 went to Yardi. At that meeting, Luke explained Realx to John Reilly and I and we loved the concept, and the technology and marketplace. It looked/looks like part of the future to us, and we have a pretty good track record of predicting the future in the real estate industry.
RealX is an "exchange" or "marketplace" that allows people to buy, sell and lease property rights. Property rights include leasing land's surface rights for solar, wind, cell towers, timber and other uses; as well as selling or leasing subsurface rights for minerals, oil and gas, among others.
RealX's platform digitizes content and provides a completely virtual transaction process. Property buyers enjoy an easy-to-use, map-based interface to quickly find available acreage that allows them to improve their current positions or enter a new area quickly.
Congratulations to Luke and Team, and to Second Century Ventures for having the vision.
