Hey, what's up guys? Clayton gets here. So, I feel like I say this a lot, but I just got some really cool guests on the show, but I am super excited to have Tamir Poleg, the founder of Real Brokerage with us today, and we are going to unpack technology, Real's technology, specifically artificial intelligence as it relates to Real as it relates to the industry as well. But get ready for a super fun conversation.
All right. So, we are here with Tamir Poleg, the founder of Real Brokerage. And again, we're going to break down Real's tech stack and how we have integrated artificial intelligence today and we'll see where this conversation takes us. I'm super excited about it because, you know, Tamir is the visionary for everything that we're doing with technology and artificial intelligence. So, Tamir, thank you so much for taking some time out of your busy schedule to hang with us this afternoon.
Of course. Excited to be here and honored that you chose me, Clayton.
Of course. Well, so let's jump right in. And you know, one of the things that attracted me to Real, Tamir, was the technology. And you know, just 15 short months ago, going on 16 now, things have changed so much. You know, the technology to me, when I saw it for the first time I was blown away 17 months ago, but it's changed a lot in just over a year. So what I really want to talk about today is, what is your vision for this thing? You know, we've got this, I think we've got an incredible foundation. I don't know if I shared this with you, Tamir, but we've got a young man in Chicago that came over from Compass, another great company. And Compass has now spent 1.5 billion dollars on their tech stack. And I was talking to Ptesh, our CTO, not that long ago, and he was like, 'Yeah, we haven't spent anywhere near that.' But my buddy in Chicago loves Real's technology and he lived in that world for several years. So the foundation is super solid of what we have today and we've obviously incorporated artificial intelligence in the form of ChatGPT 4.0. But where are we going? What do you see this thing going? And if you want to talk about the foundation at all, please do. But I really want to talk about the vision of where this thing is going, not just in the next two, three, four, five years, but in the immediate future.
It's a big question, but since you mentioned Compass and the 1.5 billion investment, I don't think that how much you invested into the technology matters. What matters is whether people use it. So for example, when we started, we didn't have a lot of money and the first thing we built was a system that knows how to purchase leads from Zillow and then route it to the best agent to actually serve that specific lead. And a few months later, we realized that agents are not really using those leads because they haven't paid for them. So they're not working them and the ROI was negative. At that point, we decided that we are going to focus on two things. One was everything that helps agents become more efficient. So saving them time and helping them perform all of those tasks that they perform for buyers and sellers. And the second thing which is equally as important is the understanding that brokerage is a low margin business and if we want to pass most of the commission checks over to our agents and let them keep as much money in their pockets, we need to build a very efficient operation in the back office of a brokerage. So what is happening in the back office? Everything that has to do with transaction management, support, payment processing, all of those things. How can we automate all of those tasks to the full extent that's possible by technology? And this is the part that people don't see because it's in the background. It's not consumer-facing. It's not agent-facing. It's our technology that we use in order to be able to efficiently operate so that we can offer agents the 85/15 split with a $12,000 cap. So if we're talking about the future, the future is a little bit complicated as always, but at the same time simple because if you would ask somebody outside of real estate, 'Hey, come look into real estate and tell us what's not working well,' they'll probably figure it out. Buyers and sellers will tell you exactly what's working and what's not working for them. But I think that for us as people within the industry, we're so into the daily tasks and so used to how transactions are working that sometimes it's difficult for us to step out, zoom out and say, 'Okay, let's see if there's a better way.' So I know that it might be a long answer but we split our focus to three main segments. One is, let's call it operations. Everything that helps us operate without adding more and more people as we grow. That's number one. Number two is everything that is agent-facing. So how can we provide our agents with the best possible platform that allows them to save time on every transaction, become more productive, and ultimately make more money? And number three, which is something that we're just now venturing into, is everything that is consumer-facing. So how can we create technology that will be so powerful that will result in a better experience for our agents' clients? And we have never been focused on consumers. We've always been focused on agents obviously. And I think that now with AI emerging and also voice capabilities of AI, it opens up an area of possibilities for development of technology. I think that we managed to build a very attractive platform for agents because of all the right reasons: because of the technology, because of the economics, because of the community. So there's a flywheel that is working. Obviously we need to nurture it all the time and not pause on innovation but we somewhat figured that part out. Now becomes the part of how can we make sure that our agents' businesses are immune to any future changes in the industry or in the economy as a whole. So obviously as you previously said, there might be somebody coming from the outside and trying to take away our cheese. So how can we make sure that we build the technology that agents need in order to build a sustainable business for themselves and at the same time how can we also make sure that nobody else is coming into the industry from the outside and offering a better consumer experience in a way that people will say, 'Okay, this is better than using an agent the traditional way and we should probably go with them.' And obviously there have been attempts in the past, you know, Open Door and companies of that nature. And that's just a signal that the intent is there and the funding is there and there will be more attempts in the future that will be funded by investors who think that this is a large enough industry. So we can dive deeper into the technology but from our focus, it's the operations, agents, and consumers.
Okay. All right. So a couple questions and follow up. I love that. Because we were actually talking off camera about someone is going to disrupt the real estate industry. It's been, for I don't know, well over a decade now, whether it's Zillow, Homes.com, whatever the company is, there are billions of dollars at stake here to try to get in front of the consumer and move real estate agents out of the equation, right? That's obvious. So what really excites me because I'm a realtor is having a real estate company that is focused on the consumer experience as much as we are. Maybe not as much, but certainly a huge part of our focus is on the consumer experience alongside the agent experience. And so one of the things that recently happened at Real that finally, because I was trying to figure out how the evolution of Leo for Clients was actually going to complete that circle. And so with the acquisition of Fly Homes, it really started to make sense to me. So can you talk about that acquisition and what your vision as it relates, actually let's explain Leo for Clients real quick and I'll let you do that. So explain Leo for Clients and then what does that acquisition mean for us as a brokerage but also for the consumer?
I'm very often asked by investors, why is real estate lagging behind when it comes to innovation? And the way that I explain it to myself is that if you wanted to innovate in real estate, you should either come from within the industry or from outside of the industry. If you're coming from outside of the industry, you probably do not know enough in order to figure out all of the different nuances in real estate, and you end up failing because you hit that real estate knowledge wall. If you're trying to innovate from within the industry, you're probably not open-minded enough to think about experiences that are way different from how you are used to doing things. I'm a big believer that as long as it's humans that are buying homes, they will be assisted by other humans. So the role of the agent is not going anywhere, at least the way I look at it. But at the same time, I think that 80 to 90% of the tasks that agents perform can be replaced and very likely will be replaced by AI. So that's kind of the premise. I don't know if you ever tried to have a conversation with Miles or Maya from sesame.com. I don't know if you ever visited sesame.com. So there's a company called Sesame. They're trying to build an AI companion. And they were the first company to introduce voice conversation capabilities by AI that were convincing enough for people to start dreaming about what AI can actually do in a conversation. So by the way, write down sesame.com, you go to their website and you can actually have a conversation with a male AI or a female AI. It's natural. There's no latency. It's just a mind-blowing experience. But when they came out with that product in March of 2025, that was the moment where I started thinking that building a consumer experience based on AI with the agents in the center, but building something for the agent that will in many ways not replace but take over the agent's role when agents need that tool to take over, is actually possible. So prior to that, we were trying to build a consumer-facing app and we said, 'Okay, there are three main components to a real estate transaction: brokerage services, meaning everything that you do with your agent; mortgage, which facilitates or funds the actual transaction; and three, title services.' And if you wanted to build an end-to-end solution for consumers, you needed to own and integrate those three building blocks. We started building that app. At some point we realized that people have 100, 200 apps on their phone, but you're very likely to use eight or ten of them on a daily basis. Who are we to be one of those apps that you actually open on a daily basis? And at that point in time, we said, 'Okay, this is going to be challenging. Let's look at how agents communicate with their clients on a daily or weekly basis.' And we realized that most of the communication is done via text. And then we said, 'Okay, if we could build an AI tool that will be textual in the form of conversation, that could be a win.' And what does it mean? It means that agents will have a phone number. That phone number is powered by the AI that we built for the agents. And agents can distribute that phone number to their clients. And when their clients are thinking about buying a home or selling a home, that phone number will be able to have conversations with them about, you know, what's your desired property, what are you looking for, what's important for you, which neighborhoods are attractive for you, what's your financial situation, getting you pre-qualified for a mortgage. And then at some point while building this, the Sesame product came to life. And at the same time there's another company called 11 Labs that is able to create an AI cloning of your voice. So if we combine Sesame with 11 Labs, it means that you have a tool that is able to speak like you in your own voice, with, in my case, with my accent. And it's going to sound exactly like you. And that tool can be powered by a lot of real estate data that we possess in house. So we went from building an app to providing agents with a phone number so that their clients can text with that phone number to having actual voice capabilities. Now, let's assume I gave you that phone number. You gave it to a client. The client was having a conversation with the AI Clayton and was looking for a three-bedroom in a certain part of the city. We would actually need to start sending listings to that client. We obviously don't want to send them Zillow links or MLS links. We want the data to be proprietary, to be rich, to include all of the possible data points that exist out there. And this is exactly why we bought the Fly Homes portal. Because Fly Homes built an amazing product that I think is superior to Zillow in the way they present information and collect information about properties, but they did not have the traffic. So we made that acquisition about a month ago and this is going to be incorporated in this consumer-facing product that we are going to at least demo if not launch in November of this year.
So it will be a consumer-facing search engine, kind of like Zillow.
There will be a consumer-facing search engine, but I think that the stronger capability is when you're now working with a buyer. Just imagine the conversation that you're having with them, the initial conversation, after which you're starting to send them listings for their review, and then they comment and tell you, 'Hey, we like this one, we don't like this one, let's go and see this one.' All of this will be handled by Leo for Clients via voice or text if they choose to. And the listings are going to be sent to them with links to our website that is going to be powered by that technology that we acquired from Fly Homes.
So can you bridge this gap for me today? One of the areas where, so that piece again completed most of the circle for me and really exciting. There are two pieces or two questions follow up. One is, how is this AI assistant Leo going to schedule showings?
Most of the showings currently are done via ShowingTime or other well-known platforms for scheduling. So Leo is going to integrate with that and Leo is going to integrate with your calendar. Just think about the efficiencies that brings. Think about the fact that if you use this, you can actually serve 10 times more clients. And if you have a way to generate leads on an ongoing basis and then connect those leads to your AI assistant or AI companion, then most of the things until you actually meet the clients in person can be automated. And those conversations are going to feel great for them as well. It's not going to feel as if they're talking to a computer. It's going to feel as if they're talking to a human, as if they're talking to you. And that technology is just going to improve and improve over time.
Yes. Yeah. Let me see if I can articulate this because I think it's so important for our listeners to understand. We mentioned a few minutes ago someone's going to build this, right? And it's probably not going to be a real estate company and it will completely disrupt the space. And so you mentioned ShowingTime. 10 years ago, maybe longer, when I started using ShowingTime, I was one of the first agents in our market in central Virginia to utilize that technology. And I literally had agents that had been doing this a little bit longer than I had been at the time that would call me and say, 'I cannot believe that I can't call you personally to schedule a showing. What is this thing, this 1-800 number that I have to call? Why can't I just call you direct?' Like upset with me. And then fast forward several years later and our MLS adopted it and now everybody, it's just the way that we communicate. And that's a really basic example of technology being disruptive and we are at the very early stages of where this thing is going. You mentioned Hey Jen. So, Josh Rogers, one of our real partners in Florida. He'll be at our event next week. So Josh has built out an automated social media tool process where about 120 days ago, he started an Instagram page. I think it's 'Jacks with Josh.' Have you heard about this yet, by the way?
Okay. You will because he's going to be on stage at our conference. But anyway, so he built this Instagram page 110 days ago. He's got 32,000 followers in 110 days. He's producing 20 to 30 pieces of unique content every single week. And he showed his wife some of his posts several months ago and said, 'What do you think?' And she was like, 'Well, it looks great honey, it looks like what you've been doing for the past year. Keep it up, right?' And he said, 'Baby, that's not me.' And so his wife did not know. Now this is his virtual avatar, his voice. And now, Tamir, it's so advanced that he's actually able to walk through virtual subdivisions and point out things and it's 100% artificial intelligence and you cannot tell the difference. So the reason I bring that up is because when I'm talking to people about everything that you just said, especially people that have not been exposed to this technology, one of the first things that they say, as you can imagine, is, 'Oh, no, no, no, no, no. It's not going to work. I can't have an AI having a conversation.' The texting piece makes more sense than having somebody calling that AI phone number and having a conversation with you potentially in multiple languages at some point. They don't trust it yet because it's so early, but in three years, this will be the standard, right?
It will be the standard when you call your bank, when you call your insurance company, when you call anyone pretty much. But you mentioned ShowingTime and you do not necessarily have to adopt this. What I'm trying to say is that Leo will be so smart that when they're talking to your clients and your clients say, 'Okay, we want to go and see that listing on Wednesday at 4 p.m.,' Leo will be able to look at your calendar, see if it's open, and then actually call the listing agent and have a conversation with them and confirm it.
Okay. I didn't think of that much flexibility. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So that will satisfy the agents. That's awesome. All right. So any other thoughts on that before we move on?
No, I mean you touched on an important point, which is people are hesitant about any new technology that is introduced, but this thing is moving faster than we think and it's going to be bigger than anyone imagines. So I think that it's important that we as a company invest in AI at the moment because in a couple of years it's probably going to be too late. And now the competitive advantage that we have over people from outside of the industry, because you talked about maybe somebody coming from the outside trying to disrupt, we have the luxury of having visibility into hundreds of thousands of real-time transactions and conversations that our agents are having with our state brokers, with our support line. This is just a massive AI data pool or real estate data pool that can feed that AI agent that we're building. And this is something that will be very difficult for others to achieve because they can rely on generic internet-based real estate data but they don't have the in-depth view of transactions that a brokerage has. And I think that this is where our competitive advantage comes to life.
