In our latest real estate tech interview, I’m talking to Parker Hills of Keyzio. Keyzio is a startup out of Kansas City I’ve been hearing about for awhile from various people in the industry, so it’s good to finally catch up with Parker for an interview. Without further adieu, here’s a bit more from his own mouth…

What do you do?

Keyzio is a technology-focused brokerage that helps home buyers and sellers connect with each other directly to discuss a possible real estate transaction (without having to go through one of our agents, unless they want to). The basic platform is free to use and then we offer optional services that range from for sale by owner consultations up to full-service agency services for buyers and sellers. It’s one part social network, one part technology company, and one part brokerage.

Why do you do what you do?

It’s often stated that the way people buy and sell homes has remained largely unchanged despite numerous advances in technology. While this is true, we don’t think it’s sustainable. The best “why” explanation I can offer is summarized best in my first post on the Keyzio Blog. The reality is that solving any one of these problems will not be easy, but this is also what continues to drive us.

What are you most excited about right now?

We’ve been a real estate startup searching for a business model for a little over a year now. We’ve considered going down several different paths and only recently decided that to create meaningful change in this industry we have to jump in feet first and become a service company powered by technology as opposed to a technology company that happens to offer some real estate services. Thus, I’m most excited about the recent launch of our brokerage in the Kansas City market. We haven’t even scratched the surface on trying to get the word out and we’re already flooded with clients. It’s an exciting time for our company in general.

What’s next for you?

Right now we are focused on growing our presence in the Kansas City market and expanding our team as growth permits. We’re continuing to invest in our technology, all of which is built in-house, and we’re setting our company up to be as efficient as possible (i.e. low overheads, virtual offices, etc.). Our goal is to do 5 times the volume of a typical brokerage with one-fifth of the personnel without sacrificing on the quality of service provided.

What’s a cause you’re passionate about and why?

Giving back to the communities in which we serve. We’re not ready to roll out the full details of our plans quite yet, but we do plan on rolling out a program later this year that will involve Keyzio making a contribution to the charity of our client’s choice for each transaction that we close.

Thanks to Parker for sharing his motivations and current projects. If you’re interested in connecting with him further, you can find him on Oh Hey World and LinkedIn.

We’ll be featuring other real estate tech entrepreneurs in the coming weeks. If you are an entrepreneur in the real estate vertical (past or present), and want to be profiled, please follow the steps outlined here. Remember, you can always discover other people in the Geek Estate community here.