Platforms like Auction.com and CoStar have changed the way we do business in real estate. Auction.com is the biggest online real estate market, selling more than $26 billion in assets to date. Without CoStar providing access to research, many small brokerages wouldn’t have gotten started. We have access to more information and people just with these two examples alone. And there are a boatload of others out there that make it possible to do business even if you are a one-person shop.Another concept is crowdfunding. It has gotten huge in a very short time, thanks to the JOBS Act, which paved the way for equity crowdfunding and provided a foundation for this regulatory structure to sprout up. According to the SEC, it is an evolving method of raising capital that has been used outside the securities arena to raise funds online for a variety of projects including real estate. Basically, it is an additional investment resource that brings John Q. Public in contact with ABC Investment Group … smart.

Taking a hard look at some of the great opportunities that are out there is also a smart move. If you are using LinkedIn to generate one-on-one contacts, the benefits are the same but multiplied. I don’t know which will be the winners and which will not survive, but many of these Auction.coms, CoStars and countless others are going to be around for a very long time.