At one of our auctions on Saturday neither the buyer nor seller turned up. Panic? Actually no worries. There were 4 bidders and it sold for a great price with the contract of sale signed by both parties and deposit paid immediately after the auction. How can this be? Well everything was signed and paid electronically and an unconditional sale completed in just minutes.
Covid has supercharged the e-commerce world in so many ways. Whilst the technology was already there, it has jolted us to understand and accept electronic signatures and money transfers without blinking. It’s just how things are done now.
It is incredible how quickly we have moved from in person signatures that were conducted like a religious ritual where solicitors insisted witness signatories had to use the same pen, to now tapping on a phone that buys / sells an apartment and transfers hundreds of thousands of dollars in seconds. The notion of printing and binding 5 contracts of sale and having all parties sign them and post them to solicitors now seems draconian and a waste of paper.
Because everything can now be signed and paid electronically and apartment owners often live overseas or interstate, we often run a sales campaign without physically meeting each other . It’s a strange concept but is increasing common and in many ways makes life easier for owners who can not travel to Melbourne or would just rather not. (Hard to image I know 😀 )
The human element in life and business is critically important and we would all be worse off if we started spending less time meeting and being with other people.
The option however is available now and it is another change to the world that we can add to the list of Covid creations.
