Property without data would be “an empty husk and a stranded asset”, Andrew Collinge, assistant director of intelligence and analysis at the Greater London Authority, told delegates at MIPIM UK.
Speaking as part of a session around how data can be best used in the sector, Collinge said data would make the property industry more efficient and more transparent.
But not all of the panel, which comprised Collinge, Rupert Nabarro, founder of Investment Property Databank, Oliver Farago, chief executive of Coyote Group, Dan Hughes, data and information product director of the RICS, Neil Burton, managing director of real estate services at Greystar, and Sandra Jones, director of Dataloft, agreed when it came to thoughts on data sharing.
“Sharing data is not the answer to everything,” said Hughes. “We need to look at the benefits and the business case. Sometimes sharing is good and sometimes it is bad. So it has to be about when it makes sense.”
But Farago said the reticence around sharing information needed to be addressed within the industry, and Nabarro criticised the sector, including the RICS, for keeping data “wrapped up”.
Farago said that beyond the data sharing issue, the sector should also realise that it is not about how data is obtained so much as how it is used and Jones agreed, adding that not all data is necessarily good data.
She said: “There is a huge temptation to collect data for the sake of collecting data, and it’s all about what you do with it. When we work with old economy property clients, the data they have is often poor and undisciplined. They think they have 20 years’ worth of data and actually it’s very difficult to get any real value out of it if it hasn’t been properly collected.”
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