By Riley Kaminer
When Alexis Leonard was moving back to her hometown of Miami after studying at Florida State University, she was on a mission to find the perfect place to live. Growing up with a grandmother who was a real estate agent, Leonard was ready to comb all the MLS listings necessary to find her new home.
“I remember I saw one house that looked so cool,” she told Refresh Miami. “But as soon as I got to the house, I realized that the listing photos had been photoshopped.” The images of the property had been so altered, in fact, that a brother visiting the property with her even said that the backyard looked like a “warzone.” Not exactly the fairytale ending Leonard had hoped for.
Fellow FSU student Sixtus Kuudaar had a similar experience. Kuudaar wanted to secure an apartment before leaving his native Ghana. He found a place online, paid his rent in advance. But when he showed up at the address, it turned out to be nothing more than farmland. A scam.
Leonard and Kuudaar teamed up to co-found Miami startup VisionX to tackle these exact sorts of problems. The idea is that VisionX leverages AI to determine whether photos of properties have been edited. If they have, the platform provides a warning to their users.
AI also powers the main feature set for VisionX: using their voice or taking a photo of a property to learn more about it. “We’re excited to provide a more personalized and streamlined search experience for real estate buyers and agents alike,” said Leonard.
Sure, platforms to search for real estate properties already exist. But the VisionX team is betting on the fact that customers are craving new ways to find their next home. They might just be onto something, with Gen Z consumers already signaling that they prefer to use visually-stimulating, AI-infused platforms like TikTok to search for things that older generations would rely on Google to find.
After having launched the platform in 2022, VisionX’s team of two has already onboarded 2,500 units – with more coming soon. They have over 1,000 users and have won a wide variety of awards, including a TechCrunch pitch competition. Locally, VisionX has inked deals with First American Title and a handful of agencies and mortgage brokerages, including Above and Beyond Miami and PRMG.
The platform, which is currently available online and available on iOS, is free to home buyers. VisionX charges agents to connect with potential buyers.
“We’re in a whole new time period where the next generation of homebuyers is so different from the last. And in order to continue on with the growth within the real estate industry, there needs to be evolution,” Leonard said.
“There needs to be more for the consumer. We are blessed with so much information; however, how can you tell what’s credible? There’s so much out there nowadays, but it’s what’s real, what’s not.” It’s VisionX’s goal to help buyers separate the fact from the fiction.
Try out VisionX’s platform for yourself by visiting their website.
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