The 1st International Conference on Artificial Intelligence for Real Estate

The past decade has witnessed the rise and adaptation of artificial intelligence (AI) in many domains, including autonomous vehicles, medical diagnosis, finance, and business management. AI techniques are also widely used in all aspects of the broad field of real estate, including among other sectors: development, land and municipal planning, brokerage, property searches, sales & marketing, appraisal, property management/operations/maintenance, mortgage lending, architectural design, engineering, construction, and smart cities evolution.

Established real estate companies have employed AI-powered systems to assist in the transition of traditional residential and commercial real estate enterprises to technology-based platforms. Multiple start-up companies are continually emerging to transform practices, boost transparency, and improve efficiency.

However, there are still many open challenges in the application of AI for real estate. Commonly discussed shortcomings of AI systems, such as robustness and low generalization capabilities, have somewhat slowed acceptance and hindered large-scale deployments of AI in certain aspects of real estate.

The goals of this Conference are: (a) explore the blurring of boundaries between PropTech, CRE Tech, AEC Tech, AI GIS, and FinTech in Real Estate; (b) identify key challenges associated with the application of AI in real estate tasks, (c) highlight promising AI solutions to these challenges, and (d) foster future research and collaboration in this interdisciplinary subject.

Conference co-chairs:

• Prof. Patrick Smith (Finance Department, San Diego State University, Fowler College of Business), Email: patrick.smith@sdsu.edu

• Prof. Haibing Lu, (Chair, Information Systems and Analytics Department, Leavey School of Business, Santa Clara University), Email: hlu@scu.edu

• Prof. Xiaobai (Byran) Liu, (Manager, Computer Vision Lab, Department of Computer Science, San Diego State University), Email: xiaobai.liu@sdsu.edu

• Jim Whelan, Member of Real Estate Advisory Board and Adjunct Faculty (Finance Department, Leavey School of Business, Santa Clara University), Email: jwhelan@scu.edu

Conference Agenda:

• 8:30 am - 8:45 am: Opening remarks, Prof. Joe Belch (Interim dean of Fowler College of Business, San Diego State University)

• 8:45 am - 9:15 am: Using AI to Redefine Real Estate in the Customer's Favor, Dr. Reginald Edwards (Senior Economist, Redfin, Chicago )

• 9:15 am - 9:45 am: AI Meets Real Estate: Data, Challenges and Practices, Prof. Xiaobai Liu (Department of Computer Science, San Diego State University)

• 9:45 am - 10:15 am: GIS and Geo.AI in Real Estate Applications, Mansour Raad (Global Chief Technologist, ESRI, Atlanta, and Adjunct Faculty, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore)

• 10:15 am - 11 am: Panel discussion I ---- Opportunities and Uses of AI in Real Estate:--
• Co-Moderators: Dr. Roshan "Ro" Corsiglia, Director, Google Real Estate & Workplace Services, Mountain View; and Jim Whelan, SCU.
• Panelists: Anand Rajagopal, Manager, ML Engineering, Autodesk, San Francisco; Othmane Zrikem, Chief Data Officer and Co-Founder, A/O PropTech, London; Randa McMinn, Chief Marketing Officer, Reali, Silicon Valley; and Foster Provost, Distinguished Scientist, Compass Realty and Professor, NYU Stern School, New York City.

• 11 am - 11:45 am: Panel discussion II ---- AI for Real Estate: Observations From Academic Research, Venture Capital Perspectives, and Commercial Brokerage --
• Moderator: Prof. Elyas Fermand, Leavey School of Business, Santa Clara University.
• Panelists: Prof. Lily Shen, Powers College of Business, Clemson University; Nima Wedlake, Principal, Thomvest Ventures, San Francisco; and Saadia Sheikh, VP Brokerage & Innovation, JLL, Dallas .

• 11:45 am - 12:00 pm: Closing remarks, Ed Grier, Dean of Leavey School of Business, Santa Clara University.