PropTech Chatter with Chris Moreno #10

Series: PropTech Chatter. Show Notes Summary Chris Moreno - Primary Venture Partners Special mentions * Company: Airbnb, Cursor, Rep AI, Gemini, RETTC, RETCON, Blueprint. * People: Jesse Itzler. Transcript (Disclaimer: Please be advised that this transcript may contain unintentionally confusing, inaccurate, and/or amusing transcription errors.) [00:00:00] Matt Knight: Hey guys. Quick episode today. Chris and I are going through what’s happening in 2026. I know it’s February, we’re late to the party, but it’s still early enough that I think this counts. So enjoy this episode of PropTech Chatter. Matt Knight: All right, man. Happy 2026. And seems like we should start with what’s happening this year. What are we looking forward to? What are the trends we’re excited about? You can go first or I can go first. Either is fine, but since we’re in a new year and we did win at the end of last year, it’s probably good to turn the page narrative wise and talk about what we’re looking forward to in 2026. Chris Moreno: Yeah. Awesome. Matt. Thanks for having me on as always. It’s Chris Moreno and love diving in on PropTech and real estate and the issues at hand. [00:01:00] I think 2026. By far is going to be the year that operators utilize tech to improve their businesses in profitability. You’re gonna see, and you’re already seeing in the last year, two years, three years, technology making the entire. Customer experience better whether it’s from wayfinding, placemaking, experiential partnerships, and, you’re seeing companies like Airbnb, right? Improving the experience and doubling down on experience, which is, entire focus. You’re seeing companies with integration to make the experience better. I think you’re also seeing a major shift in real estate where real estate had taken a backseat. Too much of the how do I say it? When you do, most consumer businesses focus first and foremost on that customer experience. And I think in real estate, they never had to, they could have office hours that were shorter. They could have a Sunday [00:02:00] closed, right? We’re not even open to rent you an apartment or to lease you a retail space. It was we’ll answer your email or your phone call. If we want to, and I always had that happen to me, Matt, when we were trying to leave space to now it’s always on, right? How do we respond faster, quicker? And you’re seeing massive differences between the profitability and the loss between companies who utilize and technology who are quick to respond, who move with action and are very creative. I’m also seeing very creative family offices. I’m seeing creative. Technology companies and then people who are from the tech world now investing in real estate with their family offices and really making a, an impact on the industry. Matt Knight: Yeah I agree with that. And I, there’s this saying about the market about. The market can stay irrational longer than you can stay liquid, and I’m hoping that is not the case with deals because I think we’ve been waiting, I don’t know about you for two years, for a flood of [00:03:00] m and a and companies coming together and companies selling themselves and going public and just deals seem to be just sitting on the sidelines. Waiting to happen and not happening. And there was a little flurry of it, but at the end of last year there was a little bit, but I’m hoping 26 is the year where companies merge, companies get acquired. Maybe a few companies that should finally give up a ghost and go bk or sell themselves for pennies, right? There’s a little bit of a culling that makes the survivors healthier, in my opinion, which sort of mirrors the real, the property market, right? There’s been a lot of portfolios out there. At the verge of going back to the lender that have not traded, and I’m hoping some of that comes loose finally in 2026. Chris Moreno: A hundred percent. I think one of the key things, and I, there’s very different opinions here. One of the opinions I have is that there tends to be, increased as there’s increased capital. There’s fluctuations on where that capital [00:04:00] goes, right? And there’s always a search for Alpha last year. There were people who were thinking about selling, and obviously on people’s different people’s timelines. Some people are three year holds, some are five year holds, some are seven year holds. Some are people hold forever and just acquire. But the people who were hitting those, from purchasing in 20 20, 20 21, 20 22, have, were starting to hit those 3, 4, 5 year periods where they’re, they’ve never had a severe cycle. And so last year in the early part of the year. People were taking deals to market, but not really marking them down to market price. And so not necessarily making the sale happen. What happened is we saw last year some folks went, into receivership or had to have forced mergers and acquisitions. And you’ve seen a lot of consolidation over the last year. Year. What I’m hearing from folks about this year, it’s interesting, Matt, is we’re gonna see a lot more deals happen. Because people don’t [00:05:00] want the alternative of if their deal doesn’t go through, if the deal isn’t purchased. And then time is not your friend in, in, in acquiring properties and selling properties. Generally, acquiring Yes. Selling, no. And so I’m hearing a lot of people ready to rock and roll, that this is gonna be one of the most, the biggest nm HC events ever of. The owners, asset managers, investors coming together but also on the tech side, right? Is that you’re seeing people say, I talked to someone today, an owner and an acquiring, acquisitions team. They have a couple billion dollars under assets. And he said, for an existing asset that we’ve owned for six months or a year or two years, it’s hard to make decisions on technology quickly. That can take months, especially in multifamily or real estate, but in an acquisition. I can make a decision, he said in 10 minutes. I was expecting him to say three weeks or a month. Oftentimes, if it fits with an acquisition, he can make that decision instantly [00:06:00] because it’s part of their story of acquiring the asset, making an investment, doing a new development, and then utilizing technology to turn it around, make an investment into the future of a year, two years, three years, whereas the existing assets, they. Path to make them perform. And it’s really hard to adjust those performers and those business models. So I thought that was really interesting and I think it can tie over to technology investments in m and a on the tech side as well. Matt Knight: Yeah, I don’t I don’t disagree and we should probably, I’m sure we are contractually obligated by somebody to talk about ai. I’m curious if you have any Chris Moreno: Yeah. Matt Knight: Thoughts on trends in AI this year in property and construction. Anything you think turns the corner this Chris Moreno: year? Yes. I have, three key thoughts on AI for this year. Okay. So my, I think number one is that AI is going to be even stronger of an asset to those in real estate than many other sectors. Many other [00:07:00] sectors have used technology in different ways, and I think as you’re seeing consolidation, as you are seeing some layoffs and you’re seeing challenges in the real estate. Operations and management and development worlds right now you are going to see a need for ai. The challenge is you’re gonna see. Number two, need for people who can manage the change that is required with ai. Whether those are the people building the AI and the LLMs, you’re seeing a big need there. And there’s a, there’s incredible demand for those people. And then number two, the change makers within organizations and that leadership who are going to be deciding on what to. Paths they do, they go down and training people how to utilize AI to make sure they’re understanding there will be hallucinations. So people who are not AI native, not using AI every day in their lives, how are they properly supposed to be utilizing… This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit verticaltech.substack.com/subscribe