Opendoor pushes AI pivot amid stock volatility

Opendoor’s CEO shakeup and AI pivot signal a push toward software-driven homebuying, as the iBuyer navigates investor scrutiny.

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Opendoor Technologies — the once high-flying iBuyer that helped define online homebuying — is undergoing a strategic reset as renewed pressure hits its stock and other prominent real estate tech names.

The Nasdaq-listed company appointed Kaz Nejatian as CEO last year, signaling a shift in priorities and direction. At the same time, Opendoor’s co-founders, Keith Rabois and Eric Wu, have returned to the board, and the company has outlined upgrades to its AI pricing tools. It’s part of an effort to sharpen its competitive positioning and rebuild investor confidence.

The leadership changes come as real estate-linked tech stocks have faced renewed volatility. Simply Wall St notes that Opendoor shares have traded in the mid-$4 range in recent sessions, reflecting sharp swings that have kept investor sentiment uneven. Benzinga separately linked recent weakness in Opendoor and other real estate tech names to an “AI scare trade,” a broader pullback that rippled across multiple sectors.

Inman has reached out to Opendoor and will update this story with any comment the company provides.

Leaning into AI to speed pricing and operations

A big part of Opendoor’s reset centers on rebuilding its homebuying operation around AI and automation.

“We are refounding Opendoor as a software and AI company,” Nejatian said last year. “Our business will succeed by building technology that makes selling, buying, and owning a home easier and more joyful — not from charging high spreads and hoping the macro saves us.”

Recent analyst coverage describes the company’s internal shift — sometimes referred to as “Opendoor 2.0” — as an effort to streamline everything from home assessments to pricing and transaction workflows.

AI tools are now being used to accelerate underwriting, standardize inspection data and improve valuation models, with the goal of shortening turnaround times and reducing manual steps in the buying and resale process.

The pricing engine sits at the center of that strategy. Opendoor’s models draw on years of property data, photos and transaction history to refine offer accuracy and risk management. It’s a critical factor for an iBuyer business where margins can swing with market conditions.

Analysts say the broader aim is to move Opendoor away from a purely capital-heavy flipping model and toward a more software-driven marketplace that emphasizes efficiency and repeatable processes. The company has framed these upgrades as essential to improving unit economics while maintaining transaction volume in a volatile housing environment.

‘The Amazon of housing’

“Opendoor is not yet the Amazon of housing — but it is increasingly being built like one,” Shrabana Mukherjee recently wrote for Zacks.

Mukherjee argues that Opendoor’s reset echoes Amazon’s early strategy: focus first on speed, operational efficiency and customer experience, then build higher-margin services on top of that foundation.

The company is already moving in that direction by bundling adjacent offerings — including mortgage products, home warranties and trade-in programs — while pursuing a longer-term vision of enabling third-party buyers and sellers to transact directly on its platform, a shift that could gradually reduce capital intensity.

Along with Opendoor, Mukherjee says Zillow and Offerpad are the closest public benchmarks for the emerging “Amazon of housing” thesis, with each pursuing tech-enabled transactions from different angles.

Eyes on earnings this week

Investor reaction to Opendoor’s reset has been mixed thus far. In recent periods, the stock has experienced sharp rallies from earlier lows but still trades below its historic peaks and would show negative returns on a long-term, multi-year basis.

As one of the most prominent iBuyer platforms, Opendoor’s strategic shifts around pricing engines, automation and marketplace tools are closely watched. They help inform how brokers and other real estate tech companies think about pricing tools and automated transaction workflows.

The company’s push into AI may signal a broader shift in real estate away from cash-heavy home flipping and toward tech platforms that make selling a home smoother. With new leadership in place, Opendoor is betting that better AI tools and a stronger marketplace can help steady the business during a shaky housing market.

Opendoor’s next scheduled earnings report is set for Feb. 19, after the market closes, when the company will release its fourth-quarter and full-year 2025 financial results. Management plans a Financial Open House livestream that day, starting at 5:00 p.m. ET, to present the results and field shareholder questions.

The company has posted a Q4 2025 Earnings Q&A online and is inviting shareholders to ask and upvote questions they would like addressed. The deadline to submit questions is Feb. 18, 5:00 pm ET.

Q4’25 Financial Open House shareholder Q&A is live.

Ask the hard questions by Feb 18 at 2pm PT.https://t.co/UcWvMseKy2

— Kaz Nejatian (@nejatian) February 13, 2026

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