The real estate contractors/constructors can utilize digital technologies to improve the performance of health, transportation, energy, education, and water services leading to higher levels of comfort for its citizens. Commercial markets are at the heart of leveraging emerging technologies such as big data analytics to analyze data on instrumented infrastructure, public and private urban transactions, and citizens’ mobility to transform urban development. As such, digital infrastructures are gaining popularity due to the access of data from various sources which can be analyzed across multiple data layers drawn from different sectors and regions within the real estate sector.
The ability to visualize real-time data and insights drawn from the urban environment identifies its connection with real estate value, provides an unprecedented potential for enhancing real estate development decisions, primarily through better forecasts for building utilization, more accurate assessment of the purchasing power of users of real estate, and by a better risk assessment of real estate users. What is more, this data can be used to segregate data that informs policy on inclusive infrastructural needs for Persons with Disabilities (PWDs).
As a result, global governments are utilizing big data to support the development and sustainability of real estate. The inclusion of these technologies in urban development enables real estate developers to maintain standards, principles, and requirements of smart city characteristics. These characteristics include sustainability, resilience, governance, enhanced quality of life, and intelligent management of natural resources as well as inclusive buildings that care for the needs of PWDs.
To achieve this, the Internet of Things (IoT) provides capabilities for the collection of data in the urban environment through applications such as sensors, smartphones, and tablets. The storage and analysis of this data is made possible by high-speed mobile networks such as long-term-evolution networks (LTE), the fifth-generation of mobile networks (5G), and cloud computing. Significantly, cloud computing supports big data collection, storage, and analysis across cloud nodes and facilities.
What are the benefits of using big data analytics for real estate development?
Big data systems store, process, and mine information in an efficient manner to produce information to enhance different smart real estate services. Also, big data enable decision-makers to plan for any technical building expansions with ease. Some of the benefits of using enabling big data analytics for real estate development include:
First, with resources becoming either scarce or expensive, it is important to integrate systems that enhance better and more controlled utilization of scarce resources. Big data analytics allow for real-time resource monitoring capabilities that enable the evaluation of resource utilization while pin-pointing waste points and better-distributing resources while controlling costs, and reducing energy and natural resources consumption. In addition, one of the important aspects of analytics is that they are designed for interconnectivity and urban data collections for resource use efficiency.
Secondly, sensor information on the urban environment for improved real estate management; is provided for by IoT enabled sensors, which detect pollution, since the number of people at a location, identification of people movement, and gatherings may go along well to inform real estate managers on what kind of activities are taking place in a neighborhood, of which can provide valuable insight concerning real estate value. The impact on commerce and the flow of people caused by various types of development and tenant mix can also be analyzed using big data analytics.
“Big Data makes it possible by permitting the tracking of property value trends, real-time rental and purchase demand as well as the growth of lifestyle”
Thirdly, big data provides for improved management and control of different real estate applications leading to increased interoperability. Streamlined data and resource sharing increase information transparency for urban developers. This collaboration and communication between entities provide improved operations, provide better customer service, creates personalized marketing campaigns based on specific customer preferences, and ultimately, increase profitability. Businesses that utilize big data hold a potential sustainable competitive advantage.
Indisputably, descriptive uses of big data include crowd-sourcing and mapping locations of public places and businesses that are accessible to PWDs. On the discursive side, data on compliance with accessibility standards can be used as a tool to promote more inclusive real estate.
Lastly, analytics not only creates a facilitative environment for better services, and efficient work and living models, and less waste (in time and resources), but also breeds smart real estate citizens endowed with a better quality of life. This is the result of better planning of living/workspaces and locations which enable better and faster services, and the availability of enough information to make informed investment decisions.
What does this imply for real estate developers?
Real estate developers need to recognize that besides the processing capacity and cost issues, designing a big data architecture is a common challenge for users. Therefore, big data systems ought to be tailored to the real estate specifications implying that IT teams and application developers have to piece together a set of tools from all the available technologies. Further, deploying and managing big data systems also require new skills compared to the ones possessed by database administrators and developers focused on relational software. However, the above issues can be eased by using a managed cloud service, but IT managers need to keep a close eye on cloud usage.
Additionally, optimizing the benefits of big data applications necessitates that industry players invest more in technology and better development efforts. Ultimately, the value and effectiveness of big data depend on the workers tasked with understanding the data and formulating the appropriate queries to direct big data analytics projects. Some big data tools meet specialized niches and enable less technical users to use everyday business data in predictive analytics applications.
In conclusion
Critically, industry stakeholders ought to set policies to ensure data accuracy, quality, security, privacy, and control of the data. Furthermore, ensure to put in place data documentation standards to provide guidance on the content and use of the datasets. What is more, real estate developers ought to have the comprehension that technology can be very useful when considering the management and protection of environmental resources, infrastructures, and natural resources with the ultimate goal of increasing sustainability and inclusion.
