🤝 Why Sellers Still Need Humans: What AI Gets Wrong About People

GROW WITH LIBERTAS & EXP REALTY

🎧 Listen on Apple Podcasts and Spotify!

More than a third of home sellers cry at some point during the sale. Not at the closing table because they're happy. They cry because they're overwhelmed. AI can write your listing description in 10 seconds. But it can't sit with a widow who's selling the house where she raised her kids. It can't tell when a seller says "fine" and means "I'm about to fire you." Buyers expect AI to be part of the process now.

But when it counts, they still want a person. Tim and Julie saw it in their own selling years: sellers cried, and it wasn't over price or terms. It was about carrying memories from one stage of life to the next, even when the next stage was better. Today we walk through what AI is bad at when real people are involved, the five places it falls short, why those gaps are where you earn your commission, and the role that matters most from here: being your client's AI whisperer.

Buyers want the tool. When it counts, they want a person to check it.

Tim's view: AI isn't a human. It may be able to feign empathy, but it won't have your emotional empathy, your intuition, or your ability to connect. The agents at risk are the purely transactional ones, the flat-fee, "put it in the MLS for $500" types. The agents who stay connected, and learn to connect with people on a higher level, will be more relevant than ever.

Be honest about the timeline, though. The AI "hallucination" and "slop" talk has faded because AI improved dramatically in under six months, and Tim expects it to close more of the nuance gaps below within six months or less. Don't build your career on AI's flaws. Use them as a map of where human value sits today, and build on being human.

A grieving customer asked Air Canada's chatbot about bereavement fares. The bot invented a refund policy that didn't exist. Air Canada argued the chatbot was responsible for its own words. A tribunal disagreed and made the airline pay anyway. Now imagine an AI telling your seller what's typically included in the sale, or what the HOA usually covers. In the detailed parts of real estate, it often doesn't know.

Here's what it looks like in practice. Julie dealt with about five of these last week with experienced coaching clients, two of them brokers. A buyer fed the inspection report to their AI, which said, with total confidence, that you typically ask for A through Z, a list running into thousands of dollars and, in one case, tens of thousands. Inexperienced agents, mostly on the buyer side, can feel overwhelmed by a confident buyer arriving with a grocery list, and handing that list to the seller will most likely kill the deal.

The fix is preparation before the first showing, not after the report arrives. Premier Coaching's pre-buyer pack includes the complete home buying guide, with a "What to Expect From My Home Inspection" resource that shows buyers what's appropriate to ask for and what isn't, so they don't walk in expecting a huge amount off the house.

A Chevy dealership's website chatbot agreed to sell a brand-new Tahoe for $1 and even called it a legally binding offer, complete with "no takesies backsies." That's not who you want negotiating your seller's equity.

Your seller texts, or says right in front of you: "Great, just great." AI reads a happy client. A human hears sarcasm and a seller who's been let down.

A seller says: "All right, whatever you think is best." AI hears permission. You hear someone who's stopped trusting the process and needs a little more hand-holding.

Picture an AI writing: "So sorry for your loss. Here are five tips to maximize your sale price." Or "Congratulations on your move!" to a couple who are splitting up. Motivated sellers often have an emotional reason for selling, and AI just wants to move things forward.

What to do: have your AI read your emails, tell it which ones it may prioritize, and have it draft replies based on your past replies to similar emails, with your approval required before anything is sent. Review the drafts until it learns the pattern. And when you know your next listing is a stressful situation, tell your AI the way you'd brief your best assistant, so it knows to be sensitive.

Remember when Zillow used its pricing algorithm to buy and flip homes? It lost hundreds of millions of dollars, shut the program down in 2021, and laid off a quarter of its staff. AI knows what's typical. Your seller's house probably isn't. Their deadline, their divorce or relocation, their kid's school year all go into the strategy, and you only learn them by asking, the way the pre-qualifying questions from our last issue do.

AI isn't going to notice when a seller scoots their chair back and crosses their arms at the listing table. You pick up on that consciously or subconsciously. AI just matches facts and predicts from averages.

Ask this in every listing presentation: "What is the most important thing to you and your family about this move?" The answer tells you more than any intake form or AI search. It's very rarely the price. What matters to most sellers and buyers is convenience and removing stress.

What you're getting paid to do is sell the house at the highest price, in the shortest time, with the least hassle. What you're really getting paid to do is take away the stress. More information creates more stress for sellers, and more data points aren't helping, they're hurting.

Your job is to go through everything AI hands your client and translate it. Don't try to convince a seller that AI shouldn't be trusted. Don't say "AI slop," and don't say "hallucinations," because that language is already obsolete. They're already using AI. Don't compete against it. Make it clear that you work with it.

The safe place if you're living in fear of this technology is spending more time with humans: belly to belly, face to face, at events and social gatherings. Everything AI takes off your plate, the CRM building and heavy lead-follow-up systems, is time to spend with people who share your interests. If you aren't keeping pace, other agents who are will pass you.

Five concrete moves:

One: listen for "fine" and "whatever you think is best." When you hear either from a seller, treat it as a warning, not permission, and pick up the phone.

Two: prepare every buyer before the first showing. Send what to expect from the inspection (what's reasonable to ask for and what isn't) before they see a house, not after the report arrives.

Three: put an approval step on your AI. It drafts, you review, and you tell it up front when a situation is sensitive.

Four: add the question "What is the most important thing to you and your family about this move?" to your listing presentations and buyer consultations.

Five: schedule weekly face-to-face time. Events, social gatherings, community. Block it like a listing appointment. The playbooks, including the pre-buyer pack, live in Premier Coaching: $1 for a 7-day trial at premiercoaching.com.

Buyers and sellers are using AI, and they still want a person. 91% of sellers hired an agent, and 44% of buyers would pay extra for a human to check the AI's work. The gaps are real today: confident errors, literal readings, bad timing, and everyone treated as an average. They're also closing fast, so build on what stays human.

You're paid to take away the stress. Be the one who reads the room, translates the data, and sits with the seller when it gets emotional. Get to work.

Ready to stop guessing and start producing?

🎯 Start Premier Coaching (free trial): premiercoaching.com
💼 Build wealth with Tim's eXp team: whylibertas.com/harris
📲 Elite Coaching — text Tim directly: 512-758-0206

If your next seller said "whatever you think is best," would you hear permission, or a person who needs you to pick up the phone?

— Tim & Julie Harris

📬 Thanks for reading Harris Real Estate Daily. Share this with a colleague who needs clarity about where the industry is headed.

Forwarded by a friend? Sign up with just one click here.

Share this issue.