Article Summary
eXp Realty introduced MCP First, a standardized connection layer that lets agents use existing AI assistants with eXp back office data. Executives said it is designed to reduce friction and keep agents in their preferred interface. AI Summary
It seems that nearly every day, a new AI bot enters the chat. From brokerages to proptech companies, housing industry firms have launched a variety of AI chatbots and assistants over the past couple of years, but eXp Realty has decided to take a completely different tack.
On Thursday, the brokerage unveiled its Model Context Protocol (MCP) First, AI of Choice strategy. Through this initiative, agents can plug the AI assistants they already use — like Claude, ChatGPT and Gemini — straight into their eXp business data.
The company said that instead of building a closed chatbot and forcing agents to learn a new interface, it’s opening a standardized connection layer between the AI tools they already use and their business data. eXp said the agents are the ones to authorize the connection and within the same chat window, they are able to connect to their own production numbers, leads, transactions, training progress and CRM records.
“When we were looking at the road map, we saw a lot of real estate companies and proptech companies building their own robots, so we asked ourselves if we wanted to build another robot that requires an agent to download one more app, create another login and not have it be native in the system, or if we should meet our agents where they are at,” Leo Pareja, the CEO of eXp Realty, told HousingWirein an exclusive interview.
Seth Siegler, eXp’s chief innovation officer, told HousingWire that eXp tried the chatbot strategy a few years ago, as leaders felt it made sense at the time. But looking at the current ecosystem, he didn’t feel like that was the right path forward for the brokerage.
“Increasingly across forward-looking SaaS companies, they are starting to come to where their users are. And we wanted to do the same and offer that flexibility and choice, and reduce friction wherever possible while also offering more functionality,” Siegler said. “We have always had the philosophy of meeting agents where they are and letting them build their business the way they want to on our platform.”
Meeting agents where they’re at
Brokerage executives said this will be a game changer for agents and teams who have already spent countless hours building out systems and workflows in the large language model (LLM) of their choosing.
“It doesn’t matter what somebody is using in their business, whatever tool they have committed to or LLM, that all can connect with the eXp back office and, long term, they never have to leave their environment,” Holly Mabery, eXp’s chief brokerage officer, told HousingWire.
“We have so many teams who have built these intricate processes that really take care of their team members. And this is going to allow them to be part of our platform but never having to leave their nucleus of the team.”
Chief technology officer Carrie Lysenko shares a similar view, saying she feels the brokerages that have created all-in-one systems and forced their agents onto the same platform are ultimately limiting them.
“Why would we limit the creativity of our agents and how they want to grow their businesses.? Why wouldn’t we instead make an open platform where they can create any system that they want?” Lysenko said. “For us to go and interrupt the systems that our agents have already created and say, ‘No, you have to work with us,’ and force them down one lane, that is not the ethos of who we are at eXp.”
As company leaders looked to actualize ideas into what is now MCP First, Pareja said eXp asked all of its technology partners to create MCP servers, which has enabled things like Canva — and soon, applications like Lofty and Boldtrail — to be connected with eXp’s technology like eXp University and Solutions. All of this will be native in the LLM of the agents’ choosing.
“We are doing AI of choice, which is the opposite of what everybody else is doing,” Pareja said. “Everyone wants to be in a walled proprietary garden, which is in line with the shift we are seeing overall in the industry, but our strategy is very much in line with our thesis, which is transparency first.”
A direct path
In preparation for the launch, Wendy Forsythe, eXp’s chief operating officer, told HousingWire that the brokerage built out an entire library of prompts that agents will have access to once they connect their LLM
“They can ask it to do things like show them their production over the last 12 months, or how far they are from capping, or who is having a birthday in my CRM that I should reach out to,” she said. “I’m really excited about the efficiencies that this will bring to their businesses.”
Prior to the launch of MCP First, Forsythe said many agents were pulling data out of the eXp system and feeding it into their LLMs, but if they wanted current data, it had to constantly be updated.
“This saves that step by having the LLM be able to talk directly to our systems,” she said.
AGNT OS
The company said the launch is part of a much larger modernization effort known as AGNT OS. eXp describes this as a “rebuild of the systems that manage how agents close deals and get paid.” The brokerage said it’s being built on the Nexus platform and developed by eXp International, with an early 2027 launch date target.
“AGNT OS is a first-principles approach to all things that interface with the agent — from how they interact with creating listings, getting paid and making things like that as seamless and invisible as possible,” Siegler said.
This means the elimination of any double entry of data and meeting agents where they’re at in the user interface (UI) of their choosing, whether that be traditional web UI or a chat UI inside of an AI tool they’re already using.
“It is a total reinvention, a look at how we would do things now if we were starting from scratch today,” Siegler said.
Staying in their lane
In taking this approach with MCP First, eXp executives feel it’s enabling them to focus on the things they do the best as a brokerage firm while letting the tech giants do what they do best.
“We are not building AI here,” Lysenko said. “We understand that there are frontier models that are massive companies, that are on the leading edge of that innovation, and this allows us to partner with them to deliver this to our agents. And I think that is where we believe where the future is.”
Lysenko added that this isn’t about eXp looking for an easy way out when it comes to technology. Rather, it’s about handing things off to experts who are going to continue investing far more time and money into AI development than eXp ever could.
“That is their lane and we are going to ride along, parallel to them,” she said.
About Brooklee Han
Brooklee Han is a real estate reporter focused on the real estate agent experience and the title insurance industry. Before joining HousingWire, Han was an international figure skater representing Australia at the 2014 Winter Olympics.see full bio
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