The organisers of an ‘estate agents vs proptech’ debate taking place today are hoping to increase dialogue between the industry’s technology suppliers and help make their products more accessible to estate agents and will include a presentation by Google’s head of property in the UK, Duncan Watts (pictured).

Agents may struggle to get tickets, though. Organiser BestAgent, the new free-to-use mobile agency CRM platform, says it has been rejecting ticket requests from estate agency groups  in order to maximise the number of tech suppliers who can come.  These now number 50, although the Property Franchise Group has made it onto the guest list.

Tech companies attending the London event include the Tenancy Deposit Scheme, Lonres, ValPal, Yomdel, VTUK, Let MC, OneDome, EA Analytics, Goodlord, Viewber, Estates IT and View My Chain.

BestAgent, which is the brainchild of entrepreneur Charles Wright, says it has 20 suppliers signed up, four pending and a further 30 companies who have expressed an interest.

And since launching in June, Charles says 200 estate agents have so far registered to have accounts.

Proptech people

Panel members at the conference are a mix of proptech people and agents including Ian McKenzie, CEO of the Guild, London estate agent Kristjan Byfield, former NAEA president Katie Griffin, Reigate estate agent Perry Power and former agent and commentator Christopher Watkins.

The conference is also going to be addressed by Google UK’s Head of Property, Duncan Watts.

“I am excited to be part of this panel discussing what I think is the most pressing problem affecting the industry,” says Perry Power (pictured left).

“It really is time the industry modernised with proptech. The BestAgent Marketplace concept is a great initiative. The current amount of repetition and duplication of data-entry caused by CRMs not connecting with other services is mind-boggling.

“It takes agent teams away from doing what really matters, which is delivering a great client result and experience.”