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iBuying 2.0: From Instant Offers to Housing Liquidity
In 2013, iBuying began as a bold experiment, with a handful of operators using Excel to test whether homes could be priced quickly enough to create an arbitrage. The insight was powerful: If you could algorithmically generate a real offer for a home, you could deliver convenience and certainty to residential real estate in ways that had never been possible.
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As billions of venture and public capital poured in, iBuying scaled from niche experiment to national phenomenon. Zillow, Redfin, Opendoor, and Offerpad all launched instant-offer platforms, saturating TV airwaves with the idea that your home’s value could be as discoverable as a stock price. By 2021, at the market's peak, iBuyers accounted for nearly 1.7 percent of U.S. home sales, with Opendoor alone acquiring over 8,500 homes in a single quarter.
iBuying 1.0 demonstrated that consumers want speed, certainty, and transparency in real estate. It built awareness that homes could have real-time pricing and showed how technology can simplify transactions. When mortgage rates doubled in 2022 and the housing market shifted, iBuying companies adapted. Zillow and Redfin refocused their strategies. Opendoor adjusted its operations and financing to continue driving the model forward.
Back in 2020, I argued the true endgame for iBuying would not be single take-it-or-leave-it offers. I met Dr. Paul Milgrom, whose Nobel-winning work shaped modern auction theory, and we discussed its application to residential housing. The future, we agreed, is a market where real-time pricing, transparent competition, and deeper liquidity redefine how homes are bought and sold. That future is now coming into focus.
The appointment of Kaz Nejatian, Shopify’s former Chief Operating Officer, as CEO of Opendoor OPEN: NASDAQ highlights this transition. Nejatian’s career spans Shopify, Meta, and fintech. His mandate is clear: build Opendoor into a product-first digital infrastructure company. The return of founders Keith Rabois and Eric Wu to the board, with Rabois as Chairman, alongside a $40 million PIPE investment led by Khosla Ventures and Wu himself, reinforces conviction that Opendoor is evolving from asset-heavy buyer to marketplace platform.
What does iBuying 2.0 look like in 2026?
AI-driven pricing
Next-generation valuation models are delivering dynamic accuracy. They draw from comparable sales, mortgage spreads, repair costs, and consumer demand data in real-time, bringing residential pricing closer to the standards of financial markets.
Fractional liquidity
Fractional ownership is becoming more relevant as affordability challenges grow. The rise of home equity investment platforms such as Unlock, Point, and Unison reflects consumer interest in flexible equity solutions. These companies allow homeowners to sell a portion of their equity for cash without taking on new debt. This approach is expanding choice and financial flexibility. In iBuying 2.0, fractional options are a natural evolution. Sellers will not be limited to all or nothing. They can sell five percent, twenty percent, or stage equity exits over time, turning homes into more liquid and accessible assets.
Integrated services
Platform companies are embedding mortgages, title, insurance, escrow, and even moving logistics. Consumers benefit from seamless transactions while platforms capture value across the stack.
Capital efficiency
Inventory risk is being managed more effectively. Institutional credit lines, securitization, and tokenization are providing new ways to finance transactions. Platforms are moving toward the role of market maker rather than inventory holder.
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The consumer journey
For the homeowner, this is transformative. Instead of waiting weeks for an agent, they log into an app, see a live net asset value for their property, and select from multiple liquidity options. They might sell 10 percent to a pension fund, secure a bridge loan to buy before selling, or auction the property in real time to a network of institutional buyers. If no competitive bid emerges, a platform like Opendoor acts as the market maker of last resort.
This reframes iBuying from a one-off transaction into market infrastructure.
In 2013, it was spreadsheets.
In 2021, it was algorithmic offers.
In 2026, it is AI-native platforms, institutional capital, and real-time liquidity.
The lesson is simple: Intelligence is now more important than raw scale. Where iBuying 1.0 required armies of contractors and billions in equity, iBuying 2.0 is built on models that price risk, connect counterparties, and coordinate services seamlessly in real time.
This is infrastructure for the world’s largest asset class.
iBuying has already proven its place in the market. The question now is which platform will define the future of housing liquidity, becoming the trusted exchange where price discovery, transparency, and scale converge in the world’s largest asset class. Opendoor’s emergence as a memestock adds to this momentum, giving the company a level of visibility and consumer awareness that few real estate brands achieve. That visibility, combined with technology, capital, and consumer demand, positions iBuying 2.0 to move from concept to infrastructure.
xoxo,
Maximillian Diez
GP, Twenty Five Ventures
P.S. Stay with me on this journey.
If nothing else, thanks for reading.
