Would a Real Estate Coffee Shop Work?
The other day, one term in the inbound traffic jumped out at me:
real estate coffee shop
I’m pretty convinced whoever was researching that is pretty damn smart. The reasons a real estate coffee shop makes sense are some of the same reasons I believe a real estate co-working establishment makes sense.
People get coffee everyday, same as they go to work everyday. Lots of what people talk about at coffee shops is – you guessed it – real estate. Why not optimize for that, and give people more context front and center?
If it were me, here’s what I’d include in the “real estate coffee shop”:
- A big tv / monitor that cycled through both new listings and solds within 2 miles of the coffee shop
- A really simple way to ask a real estate question (anonymously if desired), with the knowledge a real agent/broker will personally answer my question without bugging me for eternity. (I still believe whoever figures this out at scale is poised to deliver the next consumer win in the industry).
- A white board with the average sale price, volume, etc for the neighborhood, zip, and city. Perhaps update it weekly with new data. Tally the number of properties SOLD the day before within X miles.
- An iPad on every table with a pre-loaded app for searching real estate.
As a broker, you wouldn’t have to own the coffee shop outright, just partner extremely heavily.
There is a cat coffee shop in Seattle (see here), why not a real estate one? Anyone want to create a real estate coffee shop in Seattle??!!
Sam DeBord
Posted at 08:28h, 02 MarchWe talked about something similar many years ago. We’d supply the TVs/computers and host the content for coffee shops that are already in place. Staffing it is a much bigger/messier task, though.
Drew Meyers
Posted at 09:03h, 02 MarchYea.. I don’t think it would really work to just sponsor a coffee shop. To make it really work, I think there would have to be a heavy partnership approach and some real estate knowledge working there (maybe not all the time, but a lot of the time)
m.s.Woods
Posted at 09:59h, 02 MarchI searched for that. Hmmm! I guess I’d better hurry up get my coffee shop real estate business opened! 🙂
Drew Meyers
Posted at 10:46h, 02 MarchAwesome. Let me know how it goes.
Otis Duffy
Posted at 20:35h, 21 MarchLets do it!
Drew Meyers
Posted at 10:22h, 23 MarchWhat city are you in?
Otis Duffy
Posted at 16:59h, 23 MarchNew york and new jersey broker. Would do jersey city, brooklyn, queens, union city, nj etc
Lani Rosales
Posted at 18:55h, 02 MarchBecause this industry can’t handle overdoing it. The real estate coworking spot here in Austin failed for that reason. I don’t think anyone would be like “I’m not going to my regular Starbucks that I’ve gone to for 15 years, I’ll try this one that’s advertising houses to me.”
THE IDEA is great, but the execution is dubious, imo. 🙁
Drew Meyers
Posted at 20:16h, 02 MarchYea, well, the people that fail at community initiatives like this probably don’t get community.. most people don’t think long term enough to execute correctly against something like this.
Lani Rosales
Posted at 08:10h, 03 Marchwe’re saying the same thing 😉