Buildings personalised to a maximum, intelligent servicing, smartly managed budgets. Construction and real estate are changing, even if more slowly than other sectors. The revolution in the industry is called proptech (a contraction of the words property and technology).

The process in Italy may well have begun a few years later than the explosion seen in other countries. But the figures produced by Milan Polytechnic’s Real Estate observatory point to an acceleration taking place.

Proptech: what it is and the meaning of innovation

Cities are changing their skin: the infinite growth model that was fashionable up to a few years ago is now giving way to an alternative and increasingly compact and interconnected scenario, where reduced climate impact and consumption optimisation are no longer an option, they are mandatory. Services too, from land registry to sales, are increasingly taking a digital approach.

There are many start-ups that would like to innovate; but the historical players on the market, whose positioning is not always “future-proof”, are also having to deal with the new trends and technology. There are four main areas around which firms, big and small, revolve: smart real estate, the sharing economy, fintech real estate and professional services.

A geography of proptech

Proptech, explains Andrea Ciaramella, co-founder of Milan Polytechnic’s Real Estate Center, has already experienced two waves at a global level: the first between 2007 and 2008 and the second between 2014 and 2015. As noted, Italy started late. “Of the 250 Italian companies we have included in our Proptech Monitor – (editor’note: of which neprix became a member in February), the majority were formed in 2017-2018”, the lecturer at the Milan educational institution stressed. The pandemic has frozen the sector to a certain extent, for reasons obviously connected with the lockdown and uncertainty; but the market hasn’t slumped and the boost arriving from digitalisation has acted as an accelerator for a portion of the sample. ”A quarter of the proptechs interviewed told us that that they have actually benefited from the pandemic crisis“Un quarto delle proptech intervistate ci ha detto di aver addirittura beneficiato della crisi pandemica”, the expert clarified. In proptech geography, Milan is ahead of the rest, with 45% of the companies in a sector which if taken overall is mostly based in the north of the country (70%).

“There are 152 start-ups in Italy out of a total of around 3,800 in Europe as a whole” adds Daniele Levi Formiggini, Head of Real Estate Advisory in neprix. “The Italian Proptech Network was set up as a means of constructing a structured team, of which we are a member. The idea is to create a way of bringing together innovative businesses, venture capital funds and traditional entities in the real estate sector”.

Proptech doesn't ignore the human factor

The concept of integration is taken up by Renato Ciccarelli, General Manager of neprix, who is proposing it again at an internal level. That is how Ciccarelli explains the course of action adopted by the company, the latest formed under the illimity umbrella. “We follow our customers at all stages along the way, simplifying the path both for those wanting to buy and those wanting to sell”. Without forgetting virtual visits, which have been extremely valuable during the pandemic.

Powerful software, developed internally, processes the data generated in the process. That may seem a colossal task:“For every triplet in the land registry records”, Formiggini clarifies, “we collect around 300 different items of information”. The figures are used to generate predictive models, useful for determining business strategies, in a constant exchange between automatic and manual processing. Because – and many people are convinced of this – you still can’t ignore the human factor in the real estate sector.