Page 3 - The Owen Report for June 2020 Inman Article Zoom Rooms

“It used to be location, location, location,” Bratton told Inman. “Now I think outside space and

a work-live-play space are what my clients are looking for right now.”

“Before kids could go to the park, they could go to playgrounds or go to community centers,
and now people are realizing how important it is to have a space for kids right in your own

yard where they’re safe and secure while you’re working inside,” he added.

Bratton said the choice to highlight his listing’s multiple office spaces is a decision that has

paid off — the home has only been on the market for four days and he expects to close on a
deal by Tuesday.

“The thing has been who gets which office,” he said of the three serious offers he has on the

table. “So, the Minnesota Avenue place is set up where you can have a quiet, secure Zoom

office with a green screen that’s set up, and you can’t hear the rest of the household.”

“That was a main selling point, and I think the home will be under contract by tomorrow

morning, and I know two of the three buyers who seem strongly interested in it like the option
of working from home and having a space away from the family to do conference calls,” he

added.

Although “zoom room” is catchy, Florida-based agent Clay Hall told Inman real estate agents

should think twice about using the phrase as it’s the name of a Zoom subscription-based
software product for businesses.

“When you enter that on a feature sheet in a major city, particularly in a luxury market, I know

for a fact that many of the buyers will have used an actual Zoom Room at work, and expect a

built-in Zoom Room system with a 40 to 70-inch display, a $1,000 to 4,000 camera and noise-
canceling microphone array and speaker system,” he said in an emailed statement post-

publication.

“It [could] get sellers into hot water [and] it [could] get realtors into hot water,” Hall added in

reference to the risk of using a company’s name to advertise. “It [could] confuse everyone in

[the business-to-business] and consumer spaces.”