Most who have gone through the process of buying a house know of the many challenges that go along with it. Find a house and do a walk-through. Make an offer. Wait. Then comes a counteroffer. Then more waiting. And now, amid uncertainty in the market, many who were looking have had plans tossed in the air, not knowing now if or when they might be on the market.
A newly launched startup is looking to change that. Looking at the “future of transactions to come,” Dallas-based HomematchX, a home buying platform that is adding a social-media-like element to residential real estate. It's also putting virtual communication at the front for a future in which digital house hunting and awareness of personal health is likely to be increased.
“At the end of the day, it’s about creating a platform that we can bring people together. That’s why the aspect of HomematchX, the X is more about the unknown, so if we want to make the unknown known; this is the platform that you want to have in your back pocket,” founder and CEO Stephen Lewis told NTX Inno. “We’re solving for the fear of missing out… and were solving for the fear of the unknown, which I call ‘the Funk.’”
The startup was founded in 2019. Bootstrapped and with the three-person team, HomematchX emerged from stealth in January. And while its platform right now is focused on the North Texas market, it has plans to expand across the state.
Lewis, who has worked as a real estate agent for the past five years, said he was inspired to create the platform through his experiences. On one hand, the pandemic has caused many to rethink plans about moving or selling a house, but there was not really a way for people to show that they were looking to make a deal months or even years out. In addition, he said there’s been lost time due to transactions that fell through because the structured negotiations of real estate didn’t allow buyers and sellers to connect with each other on a more personal level.
“When you look at a buyer and seller, there can be joy, it’s just making sure the property gets sold and negotiated and everybody feels like they won out of it,” Lewis said.
Through HomematchX’s platform, users can set up profiles based on their likes, desired time of move, send video streams and connect to agents. Lewis said the profiles of wants, which users can put up on a “dream board,” allows them to browse through houses on the market that fit their likes. He said it also helps agents, because they can get an idea of the types of houses to present. Through the video streams, which during the Covid-19 pandemic have become the norm when first looking, people can get an idea of the house and connect a little bit with the seller. He said this part is most important, not only because it brings a bit more humanness to the process but also because it can allow people to signal their willingness to be flexible on negotiations.
"it’s not a buyer’s market it’s not a seller’s market it’s about being flexible."
“More times than not, you don’t find your house on the first shot, but you find something about the homes that you like,” Lewis said. “I always see the market as more of an a la carte model where buyers and sellers come together, bringing the agent to the conversation from a contractual perspective… But ultimately, you’re finding that people can talk amongst each other much faster to get a deal done.”
HomematchX operates on a tier model, with more features, like more geo-specified searches and more video streaming time being added with each paid tier. However, the entry-level option is free. Unlike other real estate platforms, HomematchX doesn’t take a cut of the commissions.
While Texas deemed real estate agents an essential business during the pandemic, in other states it was not. Overall, in North Texas the pandemic has caused single-family home purchases to drop by 17% compared to the same time last year – one of the biggest declines in the last decade. And it will likely have lingering effects on the way transactions take place.
HomematchX has its eyes on growth. Lewis said his connections in real estate across Texas has allowed him to begin working with agents in other cities for a planned expansion. The company is hoping to break into markets in Houston, Austin and San Antonio by the end of the year.
“I think right now, with the pandemic, it’s not a buyer’s market it’s not a seller’s market it’s about being flexible, and so you find two people who are willing to be flexible together for the sake of getting it done and moving forward,” Lewis said. “Even from the Great Depression, Texas has remained a stronger state that has been able to survive. We’re moving more into a digital age, where we’re being forced to experience what home shopping is like from your phone.”
