It can be said that our country was changed forever on the day that I started in the
commercial real estate business…that day was September 11, 2001.
Now let’s fast forward twelve years. Everyone is aware of the changes that our country has gone through, but what about the commercial real estate industry?
The three biggest changes I have seen in the commercial real estate industry over the past twelve years are technology, technology and technology.
Gone are the days of spending ten minutes at the fax machine hoping that all fifteen pages of your document went through (and were legible). Not to mention how much more time was wasted if the other fax line was busy. Now it is just a matter of attaching a file and clicking the “send” button.
Gone are the multiple hours spent at the county offices searching for aerials, deeds and parcel information. Now we have Google Earth and the Dallas Country Appraisal District information is on line, right at our fingertips.
And gone are the days of tracking available buildings on a spreadsheet and relying on the post office to send out marketing materials. The creation of Costar, Loopnet, Xceligent and others now allow for very specific searches with filtered criteria in any given market. In addition, marketing materials can be sent out to thousands of brokers in seconds with one email and available spaces can be posted on one of these sites in minutes.
The speed, availability and mobility of information for commercial real estate players is simply amazing compared to my early years in the business. It is now just as easy to keep information and deals moving forward on a laptop while in the office as it is on a tablet or mobile phone from five or five hundred miles away from the office.
Brian Pafford is a Senior Vice President, Managing Partner for
Bradford Commercial Real Estate Services in the Stemmons submarket. 1445 MacArthur Drive, Suite 116 Carrollton, TX 75007 Ph: 972-389.9002
September 18, 2013
