There's a new AVM or "AI valuation" landing almost every week now, and lenders and brokers keep asking me the same thing: which one should they trust. The trade press has decided 2026 is the year property AI moves from experimentation to delivery.
Maybe. But notice what almost none of the launches lead with.
The data underneath.
They lead with the model, the interface, the speed. The thing a lender or insurer actually has to stand behind – where the numbers came from, how current they are, whether you can trace a valuation back to its sources – tends to be the small print.
That's backwards for anyone in finance and risk. A valuation you can't trace isn't a faster decision. It's an exposure you've automated.
Delivery, for this audience, isn't a slicker model. It's a number you could put in front of a regulator eighteen months from now and explain, line by line.
The clever model is becoming a commodity. Provenance isn't.
If you're pitched an AI valuation this year, which would you interrogate harder: the model, or the data it ran on?
Co-founder of Propalt and a property investor and developer for 20 years
