Is This the Real Estate Sign of the Future?

• July 18th 2018

by Nena Perry-Brown

While some jurisdictions are debating whether the "For Sale" real estate sign should be banned from front yards, one real estate company is looking to modernize the entire concept.

Last week, Compass previewed new customizable digital For Sale signs with smartphone connectivity, Inman reports. Rather than a rectangular sign on a stick, the new sign will be a circular, illuminated powder-coated metal sign with a QR code that links to details about the listing. Anyone who has the Compass app downloaded on their phone will receive a notification about the listing once they come within 20 feet of the sign. 

“When we start thinking about the sign we start thinking about how our business is anchored in both the digital world because of the technology we’re building and in the physical world because our agents are in the physical world,” explains Maëlle Gavet, Compass’ chief operating officer. “We started thinking about how to link the two and the sign became a pretty obvious place to continue that discussion.”

Compass has teased that the signs' capabilities will eventually be expanded to include elements of augmented reality, from opening 3D tours to controlling the lights inside the house or activating the sign like a lockbox. 

The initial run of signs also come with a partnership with navigation app Waze, which will integrate pinpoints of the signs' locations on their maps. Agents will be able to preorder the first 500 signs from Compass starting July 30th and we could begin seeing them on lawns as early as September.

This article originally published at https://dc.urbanturf.com/articles/blog/is-this-the-real-estate-sign-of-the-future/14233.