There has been a significant push over the past few years to focus on individuals’ data privacy and control. There is a lot of attention on big technology companies’ use of customer data. Alexa, Google Home, and the like are attention getters. Websites, cellular providers, and other service providers get a lot of attention but not the front page as often.
But when it comes to individual data, real estate can take the cake. It doesn’t take much at all to know when, where and how a person works throughout the day. The technology exists to track every action they make on a businesses’ behalf throughout the week. Given that people spend a significant chunk of their life at work, this can add up to a lot of data.
There is one big difference between tech firms and real estate organizations: their business model. Tech firms often are built around a business model of monetizing their customer data. This puts the data into play and allows it to be connected to other data sets. Real estate organizations are cost centers designed to optimize their customers’ workplace experience.
Why bother thinking about this issue? As the reach of big Tech firms grows, they will begin offering services that can better and better support real estate organizations. This would put that highly personalized work day data at risk of becoming part of the data pool that exists out there. Today, most of the tools for real estate exist through companies specifically operating within the real estate world. If this starts to change, it could make for some interesting (and awkward) conversations.