OPINION: It’s time to free letting agents from the ‘tech trap’

Not long ago, letting agents were wrestling against tech so sluggish that its novelty barely justified its use. I can still remember a time when our industry ran almost entirely on paper and whiteboards.

We’ve come a long way from that. New technologies have taken the lettings sector by storm, with many agencies now leveraging innovative AI tools to help them grow their business and spend more time on the high-impact work only humans can do.

Investing in these tech tools is certainly the right instinct, especially for agencies who are looking to stay ahead. But a recent Goodlord survey shows there’s still a discrepancy between the money they are investing in new technology, and the rewards they’re reaping. When asked about the impact of new technology on their business, more than a quarter (27%) of letting agents report that it actively adds complexity, and a further 28% report that it makes no meaningful difference to workload. In other words, over half of our industry isn’t seeing value from tech.

This is the ‘tech trap’. Agents are investing in systems that promise to lighten the load – knowing they need them to stay ahead – only for those very systems to slow them down. This isn’t necessarily a failure of the tech itself. More often, it stems from agencies over-tooling and under-strategising.

Building a coherent tech strategy is no easy task. I know as well as anyone that tech providers talk a good game, and it can be especially difficult for smaller agencies trying to modernise to separate impressive marketing noise from solutions which deliver real substance.

We already know the areas where tech could make the biggest difference for lettings agents. Goodlord data shows their biggest bottlenecks sit squarely in admin pressure, tenant management, and compliance. One in five agents say they spend too much time on admin, while a further three-quarters say that it actively stymies growth. Handing this work to the right tech could result in a significant payoff. The same impact would be felt for tenant management, where 47% of agents say the demands of managing tenants is limiting business.

As for compliance, 1 in 10 (11%) agents cite this as a major drain, with many still manually tracking and uploading AML checks, certificates, and sanctions screenings. Automating these processes has the potential to alleviate the pressure. And crucially, with the Renters’ Rights Act now demanding watertight compliance across all portfolios, relying on slow manual checks creates unnecessary legal risk and steals time agents should be using to drive growth.

Unfortunately, recognising which bottlenecks need fixing is only half the job. Extracting real value from technology means finding and integrating the right tools for every part of an agency’s operations.

Many agencies have built their tech stack gradually, adding tools as needs arose – whether that’s a deposit protection scheme, a CRM, a maintenance platform, and so on. But without an overarching strategy guiding those decisions, those tools can’t be expected to integrate cleanly. The gaps between them will show up in agents’ workloads, and they’re left jumping between platforms, duplicating data, and stitching processes together by hand.

So instead of adopting “tech for tech’s sake”, agents must invest in smarter tools that free up time for things that generate real value for their business. The platforms to invest in are those which target core operational bottlenecks. Specificity, here, is crucial. Many tech vendors seem to be of the belief that more features equal more value, so they build solutions and then look for the problems. Unsurprisingly, these tools end up being generic, surface-level, and ultimately not very useful to agents. Where possible, always opt for software which is purpose-built to meet the exact needs of your business.

Other platforms worth considering are the ones designed to replace fragmented systems with a single, connected workflow. The right platform brings things like referencing, deposit protection, and document signing into one place, removing the need to log into a myriad of different third-party portals.

Equally important is choosing solutions that are simple, secure, and scalable. Tech is there to make your life easier and give you less to focus on, not create more problems to solve. Agents can check whether a platform provides self-service portals that give clients direct access to essential documents. They can also look for cloud accessibility so staff can securely update records and portfolios from any device. And finally, the ultimate test: will this investment allow you to add more properties without piling additional work onto your staff? Enabling your team to handle a substantially higher property volume without the usual admin overload is where real gains are made.

It’s incredibly encouraging to see the industry embrace new tech, but the onus is now on both sides to make sure that the tech we’re implementing truly delivers. PropTechs must focus on delivering effective tools that make integration genuinely easy, ensuring agents aren’t left fine-tuning tools they’ve already bought to make them usable. Agents, in turn, need to be strategic about choosing platforms that actually fit together and fit the way they work. When they do, they should start to see their investments pay off, and free themselves from the ‘tech trap’.

Donovan Frew, chief technology officer, Goodlord.