Could The Real Estate Industry Win A "Paper less Challenge" And Help Save The Enviroment?

Does anyone have any idea how many trees would be saved if the real estate industry went t paperless? I'm not sure about that number either but what I do know for sure is that it would be a high number. In this modern technological era there's many things that can help businesses reduce their paper consumption if not eliminate the use of paper all together or parts there of.

Here on the Lombardi Team we've incorporated into our business plan ways to reduce the use of paper when ever possible. Though there are certain things that will always require a physical document, such as deeds, it is possible to reduce paper consumption. Here are just a few of the ways that we're trying to do our part to help the environment by reducing our use of paper.

• Listing presentation- We're now in the process of incorporating the use of tablet devices as our primary means of doing our listing presentation where as before we would make this a binder of printed documents. Remember trying to perforate all of those sheets of paper and then getting that plastic spiral binder on?
• Digital signatures- There are several pieces of software that will allow you to send documents for signatures electronically thus eliminating the need to print, scan or fax the documents over, have the client print, sign, return and print the documents once more. That alone could save hundreds of trees.
•  QR Codes- With the proliferation of Smartphones using these fairly new scannable codes that can eliminate the need to use flyers at a listing. This method of sending home information to perspective buyers is instantaneous and unlike flyers it will never run out till you take the code down from the Internet.

As more ways of reducing paper consumption are discovered we'll take a look at them and evaluate whether or not they can be implemented in real estate. Let's all do our part to save as many of our planets natural resources so that future generation will have a better place to live. Remember, every little bit counts so don't be discourage to do even the smallest of things.

"This post is written as a submission to the ActiveRain & Kodak Paper-less Challenge contest.  I have the chance to win the high speed KODAK SCANMATE i1120 Scanner, great for helping real estate professionals reduce their stacks of paper by scanning contracts, photos and business cards in seconds."