Chris Heller, a real estate veteran who previously led Keller Williams and now works as an executive for OJO Labs, has joined real estate content startup Blended Sense as an adviser.
Chris Heller
Heller and Blended Sense announced the news in a statement Wednesday, saying that Heller will “help advise Blended Sense as it scales its platform and better positions itself to become a household brand across all of real estate in 2022.” The statement also notes that Heller has invested in the company, though financial details of that investment have not been publicly disclosed. In an email, Heller told Inman he is not a lead investor with the company.
Blended Sense, based in Austin, Texas, provides a platform that manages and centralizes the type of content that real estate professionals might use in their marketing efforts. The company also connects agents, teams and brokerages with content professionals.
In Wednesday’s statement, Heller noted that Austin has become a hub for real estate innovation, adding that “after all my years in real estate, Blended Sense got me excited because now more than ever before, the need for agents and brokerages to communicate their value is vital.”
“Blended Sense is the perfect platform to do that,” Heller added.
Heller currently serves as the chief real estate officer for technology startup OJO Labs. He will continue in that position even as he advises Blended Sense. He also spent nearly 15 years at Keller Williams, including a two-and-a-half year run as the company’s CEO. He left Keller Williams in 2020.
In addition to being an adviser at Blended Sense, Heller serves as an adviser to real estate startup Orchard and robotic letter-writing startup Audience.co.
Albert Baez
Blended Sense employs 15 people but plans to expand the team to 40 by the end of the year, Wednesday’s statement notes.
Company President Albert Baez concluded in Wednesday’s statement that the company sees itself as “making high-quality content production accessible and meeting the expectations in the fast-paced world of real estate.”
