Buying a home might be one of the biggest purchases of your life. A new platform from a Honolulu startup aims to make finding the right Realtor easier.
Dubbed Tochigami — Japanese for “landlord” or “land god” — the platform helps pair homebuyers and real estate agents through dating app-style matching.
Tochigami was created by Jason Chung, who has lived in the Islands for 25 years and has been a licensed real estate agent for more than a decade.
He began working on Tochigami in 2019.
The platform launched as a website in August and, as of early November, more than 150 O‘ahu-based agents have joined. The goal is to bring more transparency — and better connections — to the home buying process.
On the site, you’ll find details about local real estate agents — including biographies, their total sales and sale volume over the last year, contact information, the languages they speak, their active listings and listings under contract — as well as listings, open houses and other information.
Now, Tochigami is preparing to launch its AI-powered matching feature. It’ll connect homebuyers with agents based on more than 50 compatibility factors, including property type expertise, neighborhood knowledge, preferred communication style, transaction history and success rates, personality compatibility and buying situation, the announcement noted.
Chung told Aloha State Daily that the company is now looking for 15 to 30 families in Hawai‘i who are actively house hunting — without an agent yet — to be the first to try it.
If you’re interested, email Chung at contact@tochigami.com with your home search details. Interested real estate agents can also reach out.
When talking about the development of Tochigami, Chung recently told ASD he was frustrated with some larger real estate platforms that sell consumers’ contact information to agents and wanted to build something innovative.
“The whole idea is all about human connection,” Chung told ASD in a follow-up conversation. “Although we use AI, we use AI matching to make the matching more accurate,” so individuals can connect with a better agent.
A recent announcement noted Tochigami will have several features, in addition to agent profiles:
- Your information won’t be sold and the homebuyer controls who they contact and when. You can research agents and properties on your timeline.
- There’s a special filter for military families to find VA-approved properties.
- You can also find legal short-term rentals on O‘ahu.
- Social community features allow users to comment on and like listings.
- You can connect directly with agents when you’re ready.
Chung says most real estate transactions can take between three and eight months, and some even longer. It’s much easier to work with someone you’re compatible with and trust, he told ASD.
A mobile app is expected to launch to the public by the end of the year, bringing with it dating-app style swiping, where users can swipe left or right on pop-ups of listings and agents.
Find out more at tochigami.com.
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Stephanie Salmons can be reached at stephanie@alohastatedaily.com.
