AI in Real Estate Statistics 2026: Agents, Buyers and Proptech

Nearly half of agents now use AI daily (23%) or weekly (25%), according to the National Association of REALTORS® (NAR) 2026 REALTORS® Technology Report, released September 22, 2026. Other AI in real estate statistics from NAR show ChatGPT leads the AI tools agents use, at 91% of agents who use AI.

Bank of America found 20% of prospective buyers and current homeowners used AI tools or chatbots in the past 12 months for homebuying research. Among US prospective buyers, trust in AI tools to help find a home dropped from 30% in 2025 to 16% in Cotality’s Q1 2026 research. Commercial real estate shows the same gap between trial and rollout. Deloitte’s 2027 Commercial Real Estate Outlook found only 8% of surveyed respondents with integrated AI solutions, with the rest in the piloting or research phase.

Key Takeaways

• Just 12% of agents say they are not using AI and have no plans to, down from the 32% who had not yet tried AI in 2025. The two figures answer different questions, so read the change as a direction rather than an exact drop.
• Writing listing descriptions is the most common AI use, at 75% of agents who use AI, ahead of social media posting at 56%.
• 32% of Gen Z and 28% of Millennials used AI tools or chatbots for homebuying research, against 20% overall in Bank of America’s survey.
• In Cotality’s survey of buyers in the US, Canada, the UK and Australia, 44% of buyers would pay more for a human to verify AI outputs, and US prospective buyers’ trust in AI tools to help find a home fell from 30% in 2025 to 16%.
• In JLL’s 2025 survey, 88% of investors, owners and landlords have started piloting AI, yet only 5% of commercial real estate (CRE) occupiers report having achieved all their program goals.
• The Zestimate’s nationwide median error rate is 1.77% for homes on the market and 7.20% for off-market homes, per Zillow.
• Zillow AI mode is live for about 20% of signed-in users, while Realtor.com+ reports up to 10% agent adoption in live markets.

Editor’s Choice

• Agents using AI daily: 23%, with another 25% using it weekly.
• Agents citing saving time as their main reason to adopt technology: 81%, up from 66% a year ago.
• Occupiers running corporate real estate AI pilots: 92%, per JLL.
• Homebuyers using generative AI tools at least once a month: 55%, per Cotality.
• EliseAI funding round: $350 million at a $4 billion valuation.
• Data center capacity under construction in North America’s primary markets: 7,481 megawatts (MW) in H1 2026.

How Many Real Estate Agents Use AI

• NAR’s 2026 REALTORS® Technology Report found nearly half of agents use AI daily (23%) or weekly (25%).
• Just 12% say they are not using AI and have no plans to, down from the 32% who had not yet tried AI in 2025. The two figures answer different questions, so read the drop as a direction rather than an exact change.
• Agents named the learning curve as their biggest challenge in adopting new technology, and 59% pointed to cost.
• 40% of agents said their clients responded very positively to technology in the buying and selling process.
• Another 37% said clients found it helpful while voicing some reservations.

Source: National Association of REALTORS® 2026 REALTORS® Technology Report

About This Data

Compiled from 15 sources: 2 publications from the National Association of REALTORS®, 9 company reports, filings and releases, 2 research publications from Deloitte and Morgan Stanley, and 2 federal regulator pages. Publication dates run from 2024, for the federal valuation rule, to October 2026. Only original surveys, company disclosures and government records qualified. Figures are reviewed on a rolling basis and updated when sources publish new editions.

AI Tools Real Estate Agents Use

• Agents’ ChatGPT use far outpaces other tools: usage was led by ChatGPT at 91% of agents who use AI, followed by 42% who use Gemini.
• Anthropic’s Claude assistant has a foothold too: 25% of agents who use AI use Claude.
• Among agents who use AI, 55% say it has had a positive impact on their business.
• AI-generated content tools such as ChatGPT, Copilot and Gemini are used by 41% of agents. That share counts all surveyed agents, while the tool shares count only agents who already use AI.

The newest numbers in the field arrived in the last few weeks.

Recent Developments

• October 6, 2026: Realtor.com+ introduced RealAssist™ AI for agents; the platform is live in 21 markets and serves more than 192,000 agents nationwide.
• September 29, 2026: EliseAI announced it has raised $350 million at a $4 billion valuation, led by Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and Bessemer Venture Partners.
• September 22, 2026: NAR’s 2026 REALTORS® Technology Report found 81% of agents said saving time is their primary goal in embracing new technology.
• September 8, 2026: CBRE reported new data center construction rose 24.8% across the eight primary North American markets in the first half of 2026.
• September 2026: Deloitte’s 2027 Commercial Real Estate Outlook reported only 8% of surveyed respondents have integrated AI solutions.
• August 5, 2026: Zillow Group’s shareholder letter said Zillow AI mode is now live for about 20% of signed-in users.

How Agents Use AI for Listings and Marketing

• Writing listing descriptions is the most common AI use, at 75% of agents who use AI.
• Agents lean on AI for real estate social media work as well: social media posting ranks second at 56%, and creating emails and follow-ups third at 52%.
• Lower on the list, 13% use AI for role-play and objection handling and 11% to improve lead generation and prioritization.
• Most of the leading uses are writing tasks, and pricing support ranks well below drafting work.

Real Estate Technology Agents Use Most

• The multiple listing service (MLS) tops the list: MLS is used by 96% of agents, followed by e-signature at 79%.
• AI-generated content sits just behind customer relationship management (CRM) tools: AI-generated content is used by 41% of agents, against 46% for CRM and 48% for drone photography or video.
• 81% of agents said saving time is their primary goal in embracing new technology, up from 66% a year ago.
• 71% cited improving client experience, up from 64% in 2025.

Monthly spending on that stack varies widely. 36% of agents spend $50 to $250 a month on technology, while 22% spend more than $500.

Looking ahead, generative AI tops the watch list: generative AI for content creation is the emerging technology agents are watching most closely for 2026, at 54%. AI-powered lead generation and follow-up draws 48%, while predictive analytics for lead scoring draws 17%.

AI in Real Estate Statistics: Commercial Property Adoption

• JLL’s 2025 Global Real Estate Technology Survey covered 1,500+ senior CRE investor and occupier decision-makers across 16 markets.
• In that survey, 88% of investors, owners and landlords have started piloting AI, most pursuing an average of five use cases simultaneously.
• Real estate’s enterprise AI adoption moved quickly: in July 2023, fewer than 5% of companies started AI pilots.
• Only 5% of CRE occupiers report having achieved all their AI program goals, while 47% have achieved two to three goals.
• In Deloitte’s 2027 outlook, only 8% of surveyed respondents have integrated AI solutions, and the rest are in the piloting or research phase.

Source: JLL 2025 Global Real Estate Technology Survey, Deloitte 2027 Commercial Real Estate Outlook

Key finding: JLL found 88% of investors, owners and landlords piloting AI, yet only 5% of CRE occupiers had achieved all their AI program goals. Deloitte’s later survey found just 8% of respondents with integrated AI solutions, while the rest were still piloting or researching. Pilots are close to universal in commercial property, and some AI has reached production, but full integration is still the exception.

Agentic AI in Real Estate Firms

• Agentic AI has reached live work at many firms: almost half of real estate organizations surveyed already have agentic AI running in some live production workflows.
• 58% of respondents at institutional and private firms have selective AI solutions already in production, behind respondents at publicly listed companies.
• On data readiness, 78% of respondents at public organizations say source data is mapped and verified.
• JLL Research identified 56 AI use cases across the CRE value chain, with occupiers and investors pursuing an average of five pilot projects simultaneously.
• Deloitte notes that without proper governance, AI agents risk acting in ways that are operationally biased or non-compliant with internal policies.

Homebuyer Use of AI

• 20% of prospective buyers and current homeowners used AI tools or chatbots in the past 12 months for homebuying research.
• Younger buyers lead: 32% of Gen Z and 28% of Millennials used AI for homebuying research.
• Sparks Research ran the national online survey for Bank of America from April 13 to May 10, 2026, completing 2,000 surveys.
• Among prospective buyers who used AI, top use cases include estimating affordability and mortgage payments (57%) and general education about the process (55%).
• Prospective buyers still prefer human expertise for touring (55%) and for legal or contractual advice (54%).
• 55% of homebuyers now use generative AI tools at least once a month.
• Three-quarters assume AI runs inside the homebuying process, per Cotality’s Q1 2026 survey of buyers in the US, Canada, the UK and Australia.
• The two surveys use different bases: Bank of America counted buyers and homeowners in one national sample, while Cotality counted recent and prospective buyers across four countries.

Consumer Trust in AI for Home Buying

• Among prospective buyers in the United States, trust in AI tools to help find a home dropped nearly in half, from 30% in 2025 to 16%.
• 68% of homebuyers want clear notification when AI is involved in outputs.
• 1 in 3 homebuyers say a significant AI listing error would reduce their trust in the platform.
• Millennials lead willingness to pay for human verification at 48%, and Gen Z sits at 44%.
• UK and US buyers are significantly more likely to pay than Australian and Canadian buyers, with UK buyers at 48%.

Why it matters: US prospective buyers’ trust in AI tools to help find a home fell from 30% in 2025 to 16%, and across Cotality’s four surveyed countries 44% of buyers would pay more for a human to verify AI outputs. For agents using AI every day, client-facing output still needs a person standing behind it.

The same trust question applies to automated home valuations, covered next.

AI Home Valuation and Zestimate Accuracy

• The nationwide median error rate for the Zestimate is 1.77% for homes on the market and 7.20% for off-market homes.
• Zillow says Zestimates tend to be more accurate for on-market homes because more up-to-date information is available, including listing details and recent market activity.
• The latest Zestimate model is built on an updated neural network based architecture and incorporates expanded historical data.
• Six federal regulatory agencies, including the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), issued a final rule on automated valuation models (AVMs).
• The rule sets quality control standards for AVMs used by mortgage originators and secondary market issuers, including random sample testing and reviews.
• According to the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), the final rule is effective October 1, 2025.

Source: Zillow Zestimate accuracy page, October 2026; Federal Housing Finance Agency final rule

Zillow and Realtor.com AI Statistics

• Consumers who use Zillow AI mode spend more than three times as long on Zillow, view more than twice as many homes and run nearly three times as many searches.
• They contact an agent at nearly three times the rate of consumers who don’t use AI mode.
• AI mode renters request a tour at nearly three times the rate and submit rental applications at nearly twice the rate.
• Zillow AI mode is now live for about 20% of signed-in users. Every Zillow figure here is company-reported, in its Q2 2026 shareholder letter or its Q2 2026 results release.
• Zillow Group’s total revenue was $772 million in Q2, up 18%, while traffic fell 2% year over year to 239 million average monthly unique users.
• Realtor.com+ reports up to 10% agent adoption in live markets since its January 2026 debut.

Source: Zillow Group Q2 2026 shareholder letter (SEC Form 8-K), Realtor.com October 2026 release

AI Proptech Investment and Funding

• EliseAI, an AI company automating housing and healthcare systems, raised $350 million at a $4 billion valuation.
• The platform now powers one in six US apartments, and more than 30 million Americans have interacted with EliseAI since its founding.
• Strategic advisory on technology or AI is investors’ number one CRE tech budget priority for the next two years, per JLL.
• Deloitte found more than 90% of executives plan to increase spending on data and technology next year, up from 76% last year.
• 16% of those executives expect to raise spending by more than 10%.
• We found no primary source that publishes a market-wide total for AI proptech funding, so the figures here stick to a named round and to budget intent from surveys.

Source: EliseAI September 2026 release, JLL 2025 Global Real Estate Technology Survey, Deloitte 2027 Commercial Real Estate Outlook

By the numbers: EliseAI raised $350 million at a $4 billion valuation, after surpassing $200 million in annual recurring revenue in June 2026. It reports doubling revenue year over year for five consecutive years, and its platform now powers one in six US apartments. Investors are paying for AI that already runs inside rental operations.

AI Automation and Real Estate Jobs

• Morgan Stanley Research found that 37% of the tasks performed by the real estate investment trust (REIT) and CRE firms it analyzed can be automated.
• It projected that AI innovations could lead to $34 billion in efficiency gains for the real estate industry by 2030.
• The analysis found automatable tasks particularly in management, sales, office and administrative support, and installation, maintenance and repairs.
• One self-storage company said 85% of its customer interactions are digital and cut on-property labor hours by 30% with AI-powered staffing optimization.
• In the residential sector, another company has lowered its full-time employees by 15% since 2021 and said productivity increased with AI.
• Morgan Stanley published this analysis in July 2025, so it is more than a year old and remains a projection, not a measured outcome.

Source: Morgan Stanley Research, How AI Is Reshaping Real Estate, July 2025

Will real estate agents be affected by AI?

Agents are adopting technology mainly to get time back: 81% said saving time is their primary goal. Morgan Stanley estimated 37% of tasks at REIT and CRE firms can be automated. Neither source forecasts AI job losses for agents; so far, AI is taking on routine writing and follow-up work.

AI Data Center Demand in Real Estate

• New data center construction rose 24.8% across the eight primary North American markets in the first half of 2026.
• The 7,481 MW under construction in H1 2026 surpassed the previous high reached in 2024.
• More than 80% of capacity under construction is already preleased, up from 74.3% a year ago.
• CBRE expects tight conditions as power constraints, infrastructure bottlenecks and strong AI-driven demand limit how fast new capacity reaches the market.

Source: CBRE North America Data Center Trends H1 2026

Conclusion

Nearly half of agents now use AI daily (23%) or weekly (25%), while trust in AI tools to help find a home among US prospective buyers has fallen to 16%. Read together, these AI in real estate statistics show an industry that adopted the tools faster than its customers came to trust them.

On the commercial side, only 8% of the respondents in Deloitte’s survey have integrated AI solutions. The next signal worth watching is whether that integration share rises in the next edition of the same surveys, and whether Zillow widens AI mode beyond a minority of its signed-in users.