Nearly a year and a half after the coronavirus pandemic forced much of the real estate industry online, a new report suggests the vast majority of Americans feel comfortable doing financial deals digitally.
The report, from online notarization and transaction firm Notarize, specifically found that 81 percent of Americans say they “feel secure making financial transactions online.” Additionally, the report notes that 90 percent of people actually complete financial deals on the internet, and that “real-estate is the leading industry for digital transformation via online notarization.”
“From January to June, remote online notarizations for the real-estate industry were up 367 percent on the Notarize platform,” the report notes. “Title (+436 percent), lender forms (+135 percent) and hybrid closings (+90 percent) were the top real-estate documents notarized.”
Curiously, however, the report also identified what it called a “reverse generational gap” in which 87 percent of consumers between the ages of 45 to 54 feel secure doing online transactions. Conversely, only 21 percent of consumers between the ages of 18 and 34 feel the same.
“Younger Americans say the ability to talk to customer service by phone or online (53 percent) or a limited number of steps (22 percent) make their online financial transactions feel most safe and secure,” the report notes, “while older Americans are significantly more likely than their younger counterparts to say two-factor authentication (53 percent), security questions (61 percent), or personal identification numbers (49 percent) make their online financial transactions feel most safe and secure.”
Additionally, the report states that 86 percent of Americans over the age of 65 have completed online transactions.
On the other hand, younger Americans tend to be more aware of things like remote and online notarization than their older counterparts.
Pat Kinsel
The report is based on a survey of 1,500 consumers that The Harris Poll conducted for Notarize in June.
In the report, Notarize founder and CEO Pat Kinsel said that “even the most traditional, in-person transactions have quickly shifted online and as a result consumers are rethinking every facet of how they conduct sensitive financial transactions digitally.”
“The data confirms what we at Notarize know to be true — people trust digital transactions, but still want safety and security throughout the process and are willing to go through the extra steps to give them peace of mind that their transactions are verified and safe,” Kinsel continued.
“The takeaway for businesses is to make sure you enable technology that provides ease, speed and security if you want to delight your customers and keep them coming back.”