Nemetschek dTwin, developed by the Nemetschek Group has released its latest report. Entitled ‘Rewiring Real Estate’, the research reveals a critical disconnect for one of the world’s oldest industries; despite the increased requirements for fulfilling sustainability compliance, the rapid technological advancement and escalating demands on property managers, real estate remains deeply reliant on manual processes and ‘gut-driven’ decisions.
The research — which delves into the priorities, tools, processes, and concerns of property managers across the UK, US, and Germany — highlights a need for vendors to bridge the knowledge gap by educating the industry on how to better leverage the technology already within its reach.
Perhaps the most prevalent theme throughout the research is the persistence of instinct-led decision-making, even as property portfolios grow more complex. 79% of real estate professionals admit that decisions about their buildings are still mostly ‘gut-driven’ rather than data-driven.
The ‘instinct over data’ mindset is further demonstrated by nearly half (49%) of professionals continuing to collect and manage data manually in spreadsheets, with 23% storing data across multiple, disconnected systems, 23% saying their data is paper based (and that figure grew to 34.3% for industrial operators), and only 5% linking data on a specialised platform.
“These figures paint a clear picture,” says Dr. Jimmy Abualdenien, head of digital twin product at Nemetschek Group. “The industry recognises the value of data but remains trapped by outdated workflows. Real transformation won’t come from buying new software to map isolated processes, it will come from connecting all operational data to achieve efficiency gains through monitoring, prediction, and automated optimisations based on the complete actual reality.”