The AI Gap in Real Estate Is About to Get Much Wider

"I don't need to outrun the bear, I just need to outrun you." Abraham Lincoln (maybe...probably not though)

Eighty-two percent of real estate agents now use AI in their daily workflow. This shouldn't make agents feel secure, it should make them nervous. Because when everyone gets access to the same tools, the gap doesn't close, it widens.

There is an assumption floating around that AI levels the playing field. I believe it does the opposite. It exposes the difference between agents who are thoughtful, strategic, and prepared, and those who have been getting by on repetition, personality, and decent timing. When the barrier to producing average work gets lower, average becomes easier to spot. That is exactly what is happening in real estate.

A growing number of agents are using AI to write listing descriptions, generate social captions, summarize market reports, and draft follow-up emails. That may save time, but it does not create distinction. The language starts sounding interchangeable. The analysis gets thinner, and the recommendations feel generic. Used properly, AI is not a replacement for expertise, it's an amplifier of it. AI can help surface patterns faster, test assumptions more rigorously, and prepare for client conversations with a level of depth that most agents still are not bringing to the table.

Here's a small example of how we use AI at FORWARD (and believe me, I'm going about 5% deep here...can't give everything away yet. IYKYK)

I have built AI into every layer of how I work, not to replace thinking, but to sharpen it. Recently, I used AI to help analyze pricing patterns and assess property conditions across a series of new development condos in NE DC. By combining real world market data with rapid pricing and finish-grade analysis, I was able to show my buyer client, in real time, how one unit compared to another and what a low, fair, and aspirational price looked like for each option. While most agents would have needed to go back to the office, pull comps, assess market conditions, and work through appraisal adjustments later, we were able to do it in minutes, in the living room, which gave my client the clarity to make a decision on the spot. What most people miss is the fact that we've spent months training our tools on the systems, data, and processes we use everyday to allow us to make these professional recommendations. AI doesn't replace us, it makes us faster. Remember, I don't need to outrun the bear, I just need to outrun you. The speed at which we operate gives us an unfair advantage and that speed is optimized by how and when we use our AI tools.

Before a major client meeting, I can use it to synthesize years of neighborhood-specific pricing behavior or identify which comparable sales actually matter and which ones are just noise. I can pressure-test my own recommendation before I ever make it. Before a negotiation, I can use it to game out likely counterpositions and evaluate where leverage really exists. Before a property hits the market, I can use it to refine positioning based on buyer psychology, timing, and the specific language that best matches what the asset really is. This is surface level stuff but remember, most agents are using AI as a new Google.

Over the next twelve months, this job is going to become very difficult and very expensive for the ones who fail to leverage the tools we can now all easily possess.

Marc Cashin is the Founder and CEO of FORWARD at Corcoran McEnearney, representing buyers and sellers in Washington DC, Maryland, and Northern Virginia. This article was first published on LinkedIn.