Rob Hahn

Managing Partner of 7DS Associates, and the grand poobah of this here blog. Once called "a revolutionary in a really nice suit", people often wonder what I do for a living because I have the temerity to not talk about my clients and my work for clients. Suffice to say that I do strategy work for some of the largest organizations and companies in real estate, as well as some of the smallest startups and agent teams, but usually only on projects that interest me with big implications for reforming this wonderful, crazy, lovable yet frustrating real estate industry of ours.

The Big Yawn: Realtor.com Dips Its Toes In to iBuyer World

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It appears that Realtor.com has finally made a foray into the most important thing to happen to real estate since the invention of the 30-year fixed rate mortgage. And I can’t help but yawn. So many phrases come to mind: What took you so long? A day late, and two billion dollars short. The Big … Read more

A Brief History Lesson on REALTORS and Race

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I didn’t really want to write this, because I assumed it was relatively common knowledge within the U.S. real estate industry that we have a sordid past of open racism, discrimination, and bigotry. Plus, I’m frankly tired of writing about and talking about social issues that go beyond the real estate industry. I feel like … Read more

Two Steps Forward, One Step Back: The Story of Innovation in Real Estate

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It’s been a while, hasn’t it? I apologize to you all, but I’ve been neck-deep in a very important project that’s taken months of my life to setup. The last few weeks have been pretty intense. I’m not quite ready to unveil it just yet, but soon… soon…. But having found a couple of hours … Read more

A Few Thoughts About Rentals

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This morning, I woke up to not one but two emails about Rental Beast, a new startup that proposes to become the MLS for rentals and integrate it with existing MLSs. One was from WAV Group, doing their PR thing, so I didn’t pay a whole lot of attention. But the second one was from … Read more

iBuyers and Brokers: A Rebuttal to Mike DelPrete

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After the past week, it is rather delightful to be writing about real estate issues for a change, rather than big social questions and difficult issues. Without further ado, let’s get into it. Mike DelPrete, a consultant and analyst of real estate technology, sent an email to his list today with the title, “iBuyers Turning … Read more

The Hard Stuff: Systemic Racism and Real Estate

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This is the followup to the first post, in which I asked whether the real estate industry was serious about race and racial issues. I am choosing to believe that we are, and that the various leaders speaking out about the need to do something are serious about that. If so, we should see more … Read more

Is the Real Estate Industry Serious About Race?

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Every American of good conscience is hurting now, both from the evil of police brutality and the evil of looting and rioting. I have been silently seething because I felt I had nothing useful to add that literally everyone with a conscience agrees on. What happened to George Floyd was a shocking and horrifying murder … Read more

Thinking Through Platforms in Real Estate, Part 2: Contenders

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In Part 1, we looked at what a Platform in real estate might look like, having been inspired by Ben Thompson at Stratechery who talked about platforms in an aggregator world. We then decided that such a platform does not exist in real estate today because of all of the disparate parts that have to … Read more

Rethinking How MLS Rules Get Made, In Light of NOW Model

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Over on Inman, Sam Debord, CEO of RESO, longtime friend of ours (even if we argue a bunch in public), and all around great guy penned an Op/Ed titled “Unshackling MLS data: It’s time to accelerate NOW.” I figured Sam was a supporter of the National Organization of Women, but… oh wait, different NOW. Sam … Read more