The obstacle to effective digitization of the real estate market is no longer technology, but people themselves
The Hungarian construction industry is entering a new era, not only in a technological sense, but also intellectually. Existing solutions can be implemented more efficiently, across multiple dimensions, with a better understanding of their complexity and effectiveness. This leap forward also helps bridge the gap between old traditions and new methods — with one leap rather than two, because two would be rather difficult. Among other things, this was what the seventh Proptech Hungary Conference, held on 14 May 2026, was about. A report.
“The number seven is a magical number for me,” said Zoltán Kalmár, founder of Proptech Hungary and host of the event, in his opening speech. He explained that guests arrived at the seventh conference from a total of seven countries, from Lithuania through Croatia, Germany and Poland to the United States of America. In addition, this year’s event featured seven female speakers, which, according to Kalmár, is a major achievement in the real estate industry, still widely perceived as strongly male-dominated. Moreover, 70 percent of all speakers were new speakers who had never presented at the event before — a huge risk, but also a source of many new ideas. Proptech Hungary introduced innovations in many areas this year — and the presentation of the first professional speaker could not have illustrated this better.
We Have No Idea Where We Are Going, but the Direction Is Right
“I much prefer the French name for the computer to the English one, because the latter comes from the verb ‘computing’ and refers to calculation tasks, while the French word ‘ordinateur’ means ordering or organizing,” said Gábor Bojár, founder of Graphisoft, in his English-language presentation. According to Bojár, John von Neumann, from whom we also derive the word computer, resembles Columbus in that both believed they knew what they were discovering, but both were wrong: Columbus did not discover a new trade route to India, and von Neumann did not build a machine that simply calculates. Instead, they both found new worlds that shaped the future.
Bojár’s presentation connected well with that of the next speaker, the American Troy Aaron Harvey, founder and CEO of PassiveLogic, a Utah-based startup specializing in building automation. Kalmár introduced Harvey as someone whose presentation in the United States had taken what we knew about digital twin solutions to a new level — and Troy did not disappoint. “A few people from the tech industry and the world of automation came together to solve the problem represented by the automation of traditional buildings,” Troy said about his company, before explaining that one of the biggest challenges of retrofitted building automation is coordinating old components, often 20–25 years old.
According to Troy, it is important that the long lifespan of buildings be followed by the right teams, and AI is nothing other than the regression of data, at scale. However, it is difficult to extract data from buildings because they can be highly diverse. The development of proprietary models, as well as the already mentioned digital twin models, can help with this — and Troy also demonstrated the latest generation of the latter. At this level, energy performance and possible problems arising from physical operation can already be simulated, so this is much closer to reality simulation than to a 3D representation of a building.
“Basically, I need three models for this,” Troy explained about how the process works. “Where is your building? That is the question of the environment. Where are your sensors and what kind of IoT device ecosystem are you using? That is your input model. And what is your system, meaning what will the input model control? These make up the quantum world model.” He added that the third step is highly hardware-intensive, as real-time AI operation requires a powerful GPU ecosystem. At the same time, one advantage of the method is that it works on essentially every building type, and it can track live changes while learning from the actions performed by the user. This enables total interaction — and, incidentally, it also comes with an LLM-based interface, because that is clearly the direction of the future. Troy’s presentation highlighted the benefits of using complex artificial intelligence technologies together. If users receive the most effective combination of LLMs and physics-based modeling, they can design their own agents and manage entire real estate portfolios.
Of course, all these advanced solutions are worth little if the sector itself does not adapt to the new methods. This was the topic addressed by Csaba Livják, founder and CEO of the architectural firm BuildEXT, which primarily works with BIM solutions, although Csaba prefers to refer to it as a “digital integrator company”. Livják is a seasoned speaker at Proptech Hungary, having appeared regularly for years, and he also often holds workshops - including one at this year’s event.
This time, he presented the results of an experiment: he sent two AI agents onto the Hungarian real estate development market, which resulted in a rather disproportionate overview. Half of the HUF 60 billion domestic market is divided among the ten largest players, while the remaining HUF 30 billion is split among around fifty others. According to Csaba, this setup is changing — or rather, it is more likely that capital will trickle down from the major players at the top. However, this will also be influenced by the interest of foreign partners: what parameters will they be looking at?
“If we issue a public procurement tender now, how should it be written in order to be successful?” he asked, posing a question that still awaits an answer. Then, following on from Troy’s presentation, he argued that a “mindset shift” is needed, because the toolset has also changed significantly recently. “In the past, we worked with drawings, then we had models. Now we have platforms, but for these to work properly, we need to build a very serious back end with databases, software interconnections and everything else. The question is: on what project scale will this pay off?”
All Right, but What Will Happen Here in Hungary?
Although Proptech Hungary primarily focuses on technological solutions in the construction industry, the event could not ignore the changes affecting the country either, since these have an impact on the entire sector. In the roundtable discussion with the telling title “Replanning – A Dream of a More Transparent, Innovative and Efficient Construction Industry”, Bálint Botos (CEO, Forestay Fund Management), Gábor Radványi (Chief Architect, Futureal Group), Balázs Lengyel (Partner, Spányi Partners Zrt.) and András Cserkúthy (Managing Director, GLT Delta) discussed, moderated by Dániel Ódor (Partner, Taylor Wessing Hungary), what kind of environment the economic and political situation following the change of government will create for the sector. “Major changes happened in Hungary on 12 April, and somehow the quality of conversations also changed,” Ódor began, emphasizing that a new direction may be coming. But what should remain, and what is it time to leave behind?
“The big question is what we do with this legacy, what kind of NER orphans will remain with us in terms of companies, real estate, completed and unrealized developments,” Radványi outlined the situation. He said that Futureal has recently been doing much more work abroad at company level, but this was not only a consequence of the NER, as markets are also changing; for example, shopping malls no longer spring up from the ground the way they once did.
“We did not participate in public procurement procedures, and we did not do business with the state,” he continued. “Perhaps now a world is coming in which it will no longer be embarrassing to work with the state, for the state, for the public.” The participants agreed that major changes lie ahead, but opinions differed on how this will unfold. Regarding priority projects, for example, there is visibly no market consensus yet, and questions around regulatory transformation will be decided by time.
And speaking of questions, in keeping with the conference tradition, this year too participants had the opportunity to give feedback after panels and presentations via QR code, and to answer the moderators’ questions, allowing the audience’s views to be reflected as well. Regarding priority projects, it turned out that only 2 percent of respondents would keep the current system of priority projects, while 88 percent would have the entire regulatory framework transformed.
And What About Technology?
Of course, Proptech Hungary — as its name suggests — primarily deals with technological solutions, and in this area the speakers did not disappoint either.
Stjepan Mikulić, founder of AI in AEC, an AI aggregator for the construction industry, gave a presentation on the efficiency-enhancing capabilities of artificial intelligence. Stjepan is Croatian but lives in Los Angeles, and after a serious construction industry career in digitalization and BIM, he decided to launch his own business. Its aim is to make it clear to companies how AI should be used properly in the industry. He sees that businesses are interested in artificial intelligence, but for now they are waiting, saying: someone should let them know when it is no longer they who have to work for AI, but AI that will work for them.
“There are 16,000 AI companies on the market, but the ones leading the way are focusing on AI-based workflows,” Stjepan outlined the global situation of companies dealing with artificial intelligence processes. According to him, AI-based business plans are indeed the future, but in order for this desired result to materialize — that is, for machine-based decision-making to demonstrably outperform the average company manager — companies need to start with the workflow. Stjepan emphasized that he is not an AI specialist and has never worked on these technologies, but when the first major breakthrough version of ChatGPT, model 3, was released, he immediately thought of how it could be used in buildings.
At first, he researched AI tools that could help construction industry players — this list can be browsed for free on the AI in AEC website — but today he focuses more on education and tries to connect different areas. “When I talk to companies and organizations, my job is usually super easy, because the founders and CEOs understand what it is about. They understand AI, they understand how to work with it. The problems begin when everyone needs to be brought onto the same page. How do you involve two thousand people at the same time? That is the real challenge.”
Education, self-development and the analysis of paths already taken were important lessons of the conference. Annalena Lucht and Márk Bukta, experts from Designa, which specializes in smart parking solutions, analyzed international parking practices, pointing out that in just a few years, many practices may turn out to be dead ends.
There was also discussion of the role of administration in increasing competitive advantage — because, yes, on a data-driven basis, even this exists — intelligent solutions for waste management, meaning that we are no longer simply throwing away paper cups, but designing and building systems that also support sustainability goals, and of course BIM, IoT and digital twin models each received their own panel as well. One of the most important messages of the latter was the importance of paying attention to foreign markets: if a sector only focuses on developments within the limits of its own country, it may fall behind. It is therefore essential to look outward and even draw inspiration from unexpected places.
And what does innovation look like in practice? This was the subject of the panel discussion “Where Does the Construction Industry Stand in Innovation?”, led by Tamás Giller (CFO, NEO Group), with the participation of Gábor Massányi (Managing Director, DVM Group), Gábor Décsi (CEO, DOME Group), András Reith (CEO, ABUD) and Ákos Janza (Presidential Advisor, Masterplast Group). “Stjepan said that the whole thing is super simple,” Décsi began with a smile when the conversation turned to the limitations of innovation. He emphasized that everyone “struggles” with the concept of workflows, and that this is the hardest part of the whole process.
“We are talking here about AI, digital solutions and data, but as long as there is no order within the company, unfortunately the whole story will not work,” he said. According to Giller, order alone is not enough either, because it must also be maintained, and if staff turnover is high at a company, the whole thing falls apart. During the discussion, the participants also touched on standards regulating systems, but it was also noted that these are often “prepared for the drawer”, meaning that innovation often drowns in a box-ticking attitude aimed at doing only the compulsory minimum.
How can this be solved? Among other things, through in-house research and development, which can also be taken to market, but the organization itself must benefit from it as well. This is essential also because many off-the-shelf products and new solutions are not compatible with already existing systems. These issues are also important because space is becoming increasingly scarce: if we always focus on new construction, opportunities will simply run out, and the market is therefore turning more and more toward improving already completed projects. What was once characteristic of logistics centers and office buildings is now also true of residential buildings — the latter require constant inspiration.
Of course, speaking of inspiration, nothing is more motivating than being recognized for good work. At Proptech Hungary, the Proptech Pioneer Awards were once again presented, allowing the organizers to support domestic innovation in this way as well. We will report on the winners and their work in a separate article later, but the optimistic and hopeful tone of this year’s conference calls for highlighting them here too — after all, outstanding achievements will play a huge role in setting the direction of the industry in the period ahead.
The winner of the BuildEXT BIM Thesis Award was Tibor Kudor-Dani. The AI Agent of the Year was Deal Score, created by Balázs Gretz. Tamás Binder took home the Smart Builder of the Year award. The Corporate Innovator of the Year award went to FDB-Projekt Kft. for Nodu, its data-driven platform. The Proptech Company of the Year was Inno by Abud.
As a closing thought, it is worth reflecting a little on the concept of the third information revolution. This is not the first time artificial intelligence has had a dominant presence at the conference, just as IoT and smart building services solutions are also regular topics.
But anyone who follows Proptech year after year can, so to speak, watch from the front row as an entire industry changes direction, and as solutions that initially appeared merely as curiosities first become routine, and then become innovations that open up new paths. AI is no longer a curiosity, but an everyday work tool, while BIM and digital twins — although still developments that many companies find difficult to achieve — are now used purposefully by those who have already adopted them, proving that progress is underway.
The future will most likely develop along the spread of AI agents and physics-level simulations — we will see how many presentations in 2027 will be about these topics.
