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AIM 2025: Google Insights

Google Insights: The Future of Multifamily Search, Advertising and AI Impacting Renter Journeys 

In a high-energy session sponsored by RealPage, Google’s Carlos Rubio and RealPage SVP Josh Albertson took the AIM 2025 stage to explore how AI is transforming the multifamily marketing landscape—from how renters search, to how properties advertise, to how AI is used in resident engagement and operations.

Carlos kicked things off by framing AI as the third great tech shift, following the internet and mobile. “We’re now living in the era of AI,” he said, explaining how Google has been a pioneer in the space for more than a decade. With the launch of its Gemini 2.5 Pro model and major updates to Google Search, Google is redefining how people search—and how businesses show up.

Today, over 2 billion searches are made on Google each day, with 15% of them being completely new. People are asking longer, more complex, and more conversational questions. That’s why Google has introduced AI Overviews, which summarize and contextualize search results with a more complete, user-friendly snapshot. Users are clicking more—and the clicks are higher quality.

But it’s not just about text. Rubio highlighted how users now search using images, voice, and even video with tools like Google Lens. “You can circle shoes in a photo and instantly search for them,” he said. “Search is no longer just words—it’s visual, dynamic, and intuitive.”

AI Overviews are also reshaping how ads appear in search results. Google now allows AI-powered ads to show up directly within AI-generated overviews, offering advertisers a new way to appear at the top of the funnel—especially during key decision-making moments.

For multifamily marketers, this means new opportunity and new urgency. Rubio emphasized that advertisers should focus on two things:

  1. Content-rich websites – Include relevant text, videos, and images so your property is eligible to appear in AI Overviews.

  2. AI-powered ad campaigns – Leverage Google’s smart ad tools, like AI Search Ads, Performance Max, and DemandGen, to reach users across the search, shopping, and streaming ecosystem.

Rubio shared that 90% of ad spending in 2025 will be AI-powered, with marketers using AI to navigate increasingly complex customer journeys that bounce between search, YouTube, display, and social.

Performance Max stood out as his favorite solution. “Just feed it your goals, creative assets, and first-party data, and Performance Max will do the rest—placing your ads across all Google networks,” he said. Campaigns using it see up to 18% higher conversions on average. For YouTube-first strategies, DemandGen was highlighted as a way to reach over 3 billion users monthly across premium content.

Josh Albertson from RealPage followed up with insights based on their own research and platform data. RealPage conducted in-depth interviews with 100 onsite team members and found that most are excited—not nervous—about AI. The top use cases they identified were answering inquiries, helping with lease paperwork, and resident communication.

Albertson broke down the renter journey into three phases: prospect, applicant, and resident—and showed how AI is playing a role in each.

In the prospect phase, renters are spending more time researching—an average of 27.7 days from first search to first contact, up from 21 days just a few years ago. Google’s data aligns, showing that renters often begin exploring options 2–4 months in advance. That research includes reading, watching videos, and comparing options across multiple platforms before ever engaging with leasing staff.

Albertson emphasized that marketing teams need to meet renters earlier in their journey, with consistent messaging across ILS platforms, search ads, social, and the property website. Once a renter does reach out, AI tools can step in to support staff.

But he made it clear: “I don’t believe AI agents will replace leasing staff.” Instead, AI should serve as a backstop—handling late-night calls, missed inquiries, or simple scheduling requests so leasing agents can focus on high-value, human interactions.

In the application phase, AI is also proving helpful. RealPage found that leasing teams often feel like “tech support” for online applications—resetting passwords and walking renters through forms. AI can step in here too, guiding applicants through the process with responsive assistance and reducing friction.

When it comes to the resident phase, AI-powered agents can assist with service requests, deflect common maintenance questions, and even trigger back-end workflows for parts ordering, technician scheduling, and communication updates.

Albertson also teased future innovation around agentic AI—systems that not only respond to tasks but collaborate across departments and systems to complete complex workflows. For example, an AI agent could receive a service request, order a part, schedule a technician, and follow up automatically—while still allowing human staff to monitor or step in when needed.

To close, Albertson encouraged the audience to distinguish between decision-support AI (like machine learning in revenue management) and agentic AI, the frontier that uses large language models like Gemini to power intelligent, interactive systems across marketing and operations.

Here is the replay:

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