(Above) Josh Team, President, and Gary Keller, CEO, Keller Williams

Keller Williams’ iBuyer Arm Leveraging Offerpad Markets to Keep Agents at Center of Transactions

Reports of iBuyers disrupting the industry have rattled many who fear agents are being removed from the real estate equation.

That may be not the case, however.

The newest broker-iBuyer partnership to leverage the role of the agent was just announced. Keller Offers, Keller William’s iBuyer arm, is coming together with Offerpad, a leading iBuyer company, to expand its iBuyer markets and keep real estate agents at the center of the transaction. It’s being made increasingly apparent through these industry collaborations that the agent value is still recognized across the board.

The new partnership will begin on August 31 in Phoenix and Dallas. The joint effort hopes to expand Keller Offers to other Offerpad markets by end of year, including to Atlanta, Ga.; Austin, San Antonio and Houston, Texas; Las Vegas, Nev.; Orlando and Tampa, Fla.; Charlotte and Raleigh, N.C.; and Tucson, Ariz.

“With Keller Offers, consumers no longer have to pick between all the options available to sell a home without having an advocate to advise them,” said Josh Team, president of Keller Williams, in a statement. “In our pursuit to drive the best end-to-end consumer experience, we’re giving consumers the most choice available. And, we believe an agent-driven consumer experience is best to deliver that choice.”

How will it work? Keller Williams agents interested in participating will need to become a Keller Offers Certified iBuyer agent. Once they are certified, they can submit a cash offer request utilizing the Keller Offers platform. Offerpad then generates an official offer through its proprietary technology and routes it back to the KW agent, who then presents it to the seller. If the seller chooses to accept the instant offer, the KW agent continues to provide guidance throughout the transaction process.

Consumers interested in receiving an instant offer powered by Offerpad can simply go to their trusted KW agent and request one, Gayln Ziegler, director of Operations at Keller Offers, tells RISMedia. At that point, the agent can also share information on how the property would fare on the market to provide the consumer with additional options.

“Everything comes through us,” says Ziegler. “We want to ensure a great consumer experience. That’s why we’ve been very thoughtful about the rollout, and the process is about elevating the experience for the consumer.”

Does Offerpad receive a transaction fee? Ziegler says “absolutely not,” adding that it is a mutually beneficial, synergistic partnership through which the businesses will continue to run independently but will come together to benefit the consumer.

The end goal, however, is to keep everything centralized within the KW platform, she says.

“We want to make sure consumers don’t have to sit at their laptops and give away all of their information to anyone that comes up on billboards or on the radio,” says Ziegler. “They can come to their KW agent to get anything from information about a mortgage, insurance, their property or about an instant offer. They can get everything under our umbrella—everything is right here.”

Keller Offers was announced earlier this year and debuted in May. Ziegler says the iBuyer arm will continue expanding, hoping to do so jointly with Offerpad. The companies are currently in talks about expanding to several other markets.

“We’re excited to partner with Offerpad, a true pioneer in the iBuyer market, to further ensure our agents are providing today’s informed consumers with the most robust selling choices and valuable guidance on those options,” said Ziegler in a statement. “Offerpad is an amazing partner allowing us to quickly scale the convenience and simplicity that’s inherent with instant offers.”

“As KW is a highly-respected brand with more than 180,000 agents and Offerpad is a massive buying platform that provides convenience and certainty to the homeowner, this partnership was a natural fit,” said Brian Bair, founder and CEO of Offerpad, in a statement.

“My background as a real estate agent, having sold thousands of homes and participated in countless living room conversations, I know that the consumer desires and deserves the best selling process that works for their individual situation,” he added. “Offerpad was founded with a purpose to deliver more consumer-centric solutions in real estate—this partnership further supports that mission.”

Other brokerages are slowly stepping into the iBuyer space. The Keller Offers and Offerpad collaboration closely follows Redfin’s announcement about partnering with Opendoor to expand its own iBuyer program, RedfinNow.

Liz Dominguez is RISMedia’s associate content editor. Email her your real estate news ideas at ldominguez@rismedia.com.