Property Firm Goes Live With an AI Agent

Property Firm Goes Live With an AI Agent: Four Weeks In

Four weeks ago, a South Wales property business switched on an AI agent to answer its phones. Her name is Hannah, she was built in an hour, and she now handles every call, day or night.

We caught up with Heather, who runs the business day to day, to find out what has actually changed.

The problem: a phone that never stopped

Macosie Properties manages its own portfolio across South Wales. That's more than 30 homes let to families, plus a handful of commercial units.

Every call went straight to Heather's mobile. On a normal day that meant 15 to 20 calls, and they could be about anything:

• A tenant with a leaking pipe or a plumbing fault
• A problem with the electrics
• A landlord asking if Macosie would manage their property
• Someone trying to sell a service

Each one meant stopping what she was doing, taking details, working out who needed to deal with it and passing it on. Because the calls came to her mobile, they didn't stop at 5pm either.

An AI voice agent built in 60 minutes

Heather sat down with Flotek for an IT consultancy session to map out how calls came in and where they needed to go. From that conversation we built Hannah, an AI voice agent, in around 60 minutes.

Hannah now answers every call with a friendly, natural greeting. She doesn't put callers on hold, doesn't send them to voicemail and doesn't take days off.

What Hannah handles

Repairs and maintenance. Hannah takes the details, shows she understands the problem and asks the follow-up questions a good property manager would. If there's a leak, she checks the tenant has turned off the stopcock. If the issue is the tenant's responsibility, she explains that and tells them what they need to do.

Where it needs a contractor, Hannah works out who should deal with it and sends the job straight to them by SMS or email, with a copy to Heather. A plumbing fault goes to the plumber, not onto Heather's to-do list.

Property management enquiries. Macosie only manages its own portfolio. Hannah thanks the caller for getting in touch and politely explains it isn't a service they offer.

Out of hours calls. Hannah knows the office hours. She answers every call, day or night, and tells the caller whether the office is open right now. Non-urgent issues are logged for the next working day, so Heather gets her evenings and weekends back.

Cold calls. Sales calls are thanked and declined. No message taken, no follow-up for Heather.

An AI receptionist that stays up to date

Hannah's knowledge is linked to the Macosie website and she checks it continually for changes. Ask her "Do you have any two beds available in Bridgend right now?" and she'll look at what's currently listed and tell the caller what's available.

The same goes for the FAQs. If Heather notices she keeps getting asked the same question, she adds the answer to the website and Hannah picks it up automatically. No retraining, no tickets, no waiting.

Four weeks in: time saved and a better service

Heather is getting back more than an hour a day, and tenants get an answer every time they call.

• Calls handled by Heather: from all 15 to 20 a day, to only the ones that need her
• Phone cover: from office hours plus whenever Heather picked up, to 24 hours a day, 7 days a week
• Cold calls and management enquiries: handled and closed by Hannah
• Repairs: sent straight to the contractor by SMS or email, with Heather copied
• Evenings and weekends: off, unless it's urgent

At an average of three to four minutes per call, including taking notes and passing jobs on, 15 to 20 calls a day added up to 60 to 80 minutes of Heather's time. That's five to seven hours a week, or more than 20 hours over the first four weeks. That doesn't count the cost of being interrupted mid-task 15 to 20 times a day.

The service has improved too. Every caller gets a friendly answer straight away, repairs reach the right contractor faster, and tenants with an emergency get practical advice, like turning off the stopcock, the moment they call.

Not sure how many calls your own business is missing? FloCX Analytics shows every missed call and who has been called back.

In Heather's words

How did you come up with Hannah's name?

"Funny story, but people often mix my name up with Hannah. So it was a case of turning a frustration into something that made me smile!"

Were you nervous about introducing an AI agent?

"Absolutely. It's daunting to think of our customers being greeted by an agent. But most people actually think Hannah is a real person and talk to her like she is."

How did you choose the voice?

"We wanted a calming voice. I was impressed that I could clone my own voice, and after a few minutes Hannah sounded like me. In the end I decided we needed a different person, so Hannah uses Victoria, a UK English voice that I felt sounded so real."

Did you expect long delays when talking to an AI agent?

"I did, but the Flotek team explained how their AI agents are different. Because they self-host the agents and don't need to go out to an external AI source, latency is reduced. Hannah is super fast to respond and you don't really get any gaps."

What has surprised you most about having Hannah?

"How quiet my phone is! I'd got so used to it ringing all day that I didn't realise how much it was pulling me away from everything else. Now I can actually finish a job before starting the next one."

What do tenants say when they find out Hannah is AI?

"Most of them don't find out! The ones who do are usually surprised, then pleased that someone picked up straight away and their repair was already with the contractor before they'd put the phone down."

What would you say to another landlord thinking about an AI agent?

"Just try it. I was nervous, but it took an hour to set up and it's given me my evenings back. If you're a small team answering your own phones, you'll feel the difference in the first week."

What's next for Macosie and Hannah?

"We plan to bring Hannah to our website as a web chat. She'll handle chats in the same way she does calls. Same knowledge, same routing."

What's next

SMS and email are already connected where they're needed. Two things are coming next.

Proactive tenant check-ins. Heather will be able to trigger Hannah from the task list in the Macosie CRM to call every tenant's mobile every six months. Hannah will check everything is alright and take details of any repairs, routing them to the right contractor just as she does on inbound calls. With 30+ households to call, Heather expects this to save her days of work every month.

Website chat. Hannah is coming to the Macosie website as a web chat, using the same knowledge and the same routing, so tenants and prospective renters get the same answers whether they call or type.

Could an AI agent work for your business?

If your phone is running your day, it doesn't need to. Flotek builds AI voice agents for UK businesses, and Hannah shows how quickly one can be up and running. They work alongside our hosted VoIP telephony and FloCX Pro Ai, and our complete guide to business VoIP explains how it all fits together.

Book a consultation and see what an AI agent could take off your plate.

Further reading

• Ai for Small Businesses: Practical Use Cases You Can Start Today
• How Small Businesses Can Use AI to Improve Productivity
• ICO turns its attention to Ai agents
• What Are The Main Benefits Of Hosted VoIP?