Patent Issued for Systems and methods for analyzing property related information (USPTO 11636551): State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company

2023 MAY 11 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- From Alexandria, Virginia, NewsRx journalists report that a patent by the inventors Davis, Timothy Joel (Chicago, IL, US), Devore, Justin (Atlanta, IL, US), Engelhorn, Amy (Normal, IL, US), Kirby, Sarah (Normal, IL, US), Salata, Joanna (Tempe, AZ, US), Schroff, Dijon (Bloomington, IL, US), filed on January 11, 2022, was published online on April 25, 2023.

The patent’s assignee for patent number 11636551 is State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company (Bloomington, Illinois, United States).

News editors obtained the following quote from the background information supplied by the inventors: “Computing device-based applications are becoming increasingly popular in today’s world of ever expanding mobile devices and mobile device functionality. One of the reasons for the increasing popularity is the ability of users to download mobile applications to their mobile devices. For example, a mobile application may be a software application developed for use on a small wireless computing device, such as a smartphone, a tablet, a personal digital assistant, an MP3 player, and the like. Mobile applications may be designed with consideration for demands and constraints of the devices, and also take advantage of any specialized capabilities that a mobile device may have.

“In the current housing and commercial property markets, disparate information sources related to a property exist. For example, some resources for gathering property information about a property a user is interested in purchasing include records history aggregators such as HOUSEFAX®, public records, in-person visual inspections of the property, aerial imagery, multiple listing service (MLS) listings, and the like. However, the drawbacks here are the need to use all these different reports and imagery in order to gather the information about the property. Also, when a user applies for a home loan, for homeowner’s insurance, for closing on the property, and the like, the information must be submitted or re-submitted each time.

“Accordingly, there is a need for instant and consolidated access to useful information that may be used to facilitate customer, realtor, and insurance agent research of a property. In addition, the act of purchasing a home also typically includes a process of shopping for a home loan (i.e., mortgage rate) and homeowners insurance. But currently these are treated as separate processes rather than being integrated into a continuum, and typically require separate application processes and re-submission of the same user information. The present embodiments may alleviate the drawbacks and disadvantages described above and/or other deficiencies of the conventional techniques.”

As a supplement to the background information on this patent, NewsRx correspondents also obtained the inventors’ summary information for this patent: “The present embodiments may relate to systems and methods for analyzing and electronically linking and/or combining relevant home purchasing data sources into a consolidated view on a user-interface (UI) for a user, thereby enabling advanced and timely research capabilities. For example, based upon location services such as a Global Positioning System (GPS) and/or object recognition, such as photo matching of property photos, a target location address may be established. The address may be used to retrieve home buying-relevant information from internal company data stores and from third parties. In addition, images captured by a camera, for example, a camera of a mobile device may be used to discover disparities with pictures of the property previously stored on internal or third party databases, such as when a remodeling of or damage to the property has occurred, as well as recognition of potential safety, liability, and maintenance concerns. Trends related to the property and/or to the neighborhood may also be displayed, for example, trends in market price over a particular amount of time, insurance rates, school information, and the like.

“In one aspect, a property analyzer computing device may be provided. The property analyzer computing device may be configured to display a combination of property-related information on a screen of a mobile device. The property analyzer computing device may include (1) a receiver configured to receive property identification information from a mobile device of a user, the received property identification information comprising a property identifier including at least one of a picture of the property and a location of the property; (2) a retriever configured to retrieve property-related information from multiple property sources based upon the received property identification information, each of the property sources comprising a public record database or an internal database of a company; (3) a processor configured to consolidate the retrieved property-related information into a consolidated property-related image; and/or (4) a transmitter configured to transmit the consolidated property-related image to the mobile device of the user to facilitate display of the consolidated property-related image on the screen of the mobile device. The property analyzer computing device may include additional, less, or alternate functionality, including those discussed elsewhere herein.

“In another aspect, a computer-implemented method for displaying a combination of property-related information on a screen of a mobile device may be provided. The method may include (1) receiving property identification information from a mobile device of a user, the received property identification information comprising a property identifier including at least one of a picture of the property and a location of the property; (2) retrieving property-related information from multiple property sources based upon the received property identification information, each of the property sources comprising a public record database or an internal database of a company; (3) consolidating the retrieved property-related information into a consolidated property-related image; and/or (4) transmitting the consolidated property-related image to the mobile device of the user to facilitate display of the consolidated property-related image on the screen of the mobile device for user review. The method may include additional, less, or alternate actions, including those discussed elsewhere herein.

“In yet another aspect, at least one non-transitory computer-readable storage media having computer-executable instructions embodied thereon for displaying a combination of property-related information on a screen of a mobile device may be provided. The computer-executable instructions, when executed by at least one processor, may cause the processor to (1) receive property identification information from a mobile device of a user, the received property identification information comprising a property identifier including at least one of a picture of the property and a location of the property; (2) retrieve property-related information from multiple property sources based upon the received property identification information, each of the property sources comprising a public record database or an internal database of a company; (3) consolidate the retrieved property-related information into a consolidated property-related image; and/or (4) transmit the consolidated property-related image to the mobile device of the user to facilitate display of the consolidated property-related image on the screen of the mobile device for user review. Additional, less, or alternate instructions may be provided such as instructions directing the functionality discussed elsewhere herein.

“Advantages will become more apparent to those skilled in the art from the following description of the preferred embodiments which have been shown and described by way of illustration. As will be realized, the present embodiments may be capable of other and different embodiments, and their details are capable of modification in various respects. Accordingly, the drawings and description are to be regarded as illustrative in nature only and not as restrictive.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“1. A mobile device for displaying a combination of property-related information on a display screen of the mobile device, the mobile device comprising at least one processor in communication with at least one memory, wherein the at least one processor is programmed to: identify a property location based on a picture of a property captured by a camera on the mobile device; compare the picture of the property with at least one historical property picture of the property at the property location to identify at least one disparity between the historical property picture and the picture of the property; generate an augmented reality overlay, wherein the augmented reality overlay is configured to visually highlight the at least one identified disparity; capture a live video feed of the property by the camera of the mobile device; and cause the augmented reality overlay to be simultaneously displayed with the live video feed on the display screen of the mobile device.

“2. The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the property location is identified via a mobile application stored by the mobile device, and the augmented reality overlay is generated by the mobile application of the mobile device.

“3. The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further programmed to generate the augmented reality overlay according to preset rules that are based upon at least one of user preferences, user settings, and preidentified concerns about the property.

“4. The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further programmed to: retrieve, from a database comprising a plurality of historical property pictures for a plurality of properties, the at least one historical property picture of the plurality of historical property pictures of the property at the property location; and perform an image analysis on the at least one historical property picture and the picture of the property to identify the at least one disparity between the historical property picture and the picture of the property.

“5. The mobile device of claim 4, wherein the at least one processor is further programmed to compare the picture of the property with the at least one historical picture of the property to determine disparities with public record data or internal data of the property.

“6. The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further programmed to identify the property location based on Global Positioning System (GPS) coordinates captured by the mobile device when the picture was captured.

“7. The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further programmed to: receive an insurance quote for the property based upon information about the property; and adjust the augmented reality overlay to display the insurance quote on the display screen of the mobile device.

“8. The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further programmed to: receive a mortgage rate quote for the property based upon information about the property; and adjust the augmented reality overlay to display the mortgage rate quote on the display screen of the mobile device.

“9. The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further programmed to: retrieve historical severe weather data for the property from a property source based upon the property location; and adjust the augmented reality overlay to display one or more statistics of the retrieved historical severe weather data on the display screen of the mobile device.

“10. The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further programmed to: retrieve risk information for the property from a property source based upon the property location; and adjust the augmented reality overlay to display the risk information for the property on the display screen of the mobile device.

“11. The mobile device of claim 10, wherein the risk information comprises information about at least one of flooding, wildfire, and storm surge, with respect to the property.

“12. The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further programmed to: retrieve at least one of criminal record data for the property, property tax data for the property, market value cost data for the property, building permit data for the property, or county assessor data for the property from one or more property sources based upon the property location; and adjust the augmented reality overlay to display at least one of the criminal record data, the property tax data, the market value cost data, the building permit data, or the county assessor data on the display screen of the mobile device.

“13. The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further programmed to: retrieve school district information for the property from a property source based upon the property location; and adjust the augmented reality overlay to display the school district information on the display screen of the mobile device.

“14. The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further programmed to: retrieve historical utility rate data for the property from a property source based upon the property location; and adjust the augmented reality overlay to display the historical utility rate data on the display screen of the mobile device.

“15. The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further programmed to: retrieve previous insurance claims data for the property from a property source based upon the property location; and adjust the augmented reality overlay to display the previous insurance claims data on the display screen of the mobile device.

“16. The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further programmed to: retrieve surrounding area data for the property from a property source based upon the property location; and adjust the augmented reality overlay to display the surrounding area data on the display screen of the mobile device.

“17. The mobile device of claim 16, wherein the surrounding area data comprises at least one of stores in the surrounding area, travel time to the user’s workplace, and attractions in the surrounding area.

“18. The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further programmed to visually highlight changes that have been made to the property over time.

“19. The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further programmed to: combine the augmented reality overlay and the live video feed to generate a consolidated property-related image; and transmit the consolidated property-related image to a customer service associate of an insurance company.

“20. A computer-based property analyzer method for displaying a combination of property-related information on a display screen of a mobile device, the method comprising: identifying a property location based on a picture of a property captured by the mobile device; comparing the picture of the property with at least one historical property picture of the property at the property location to identify at least one disparity between the historical property picture and the picture of the property; generating an augmented reality overlay, wherein the augmented reality overlay is configured to visually highlight the at least one identified disparity; capturing a live video feed of the property by the camera of the mobile device; and cause the augmented reality overlay to be simultaneously displayed with the live video feed on the display screen of the mobile device.”

For additional information on this patent, see: Davis, Timothy Joel. Systems and methods for analyzing property related information. U.S. Patent Number 11636551, filed January 11, 2022, and published online on April 25, 2023. Patent URL (for desktop use only): https://ppubs.uspto.gov/pubwebapp/external.html?q=(11636551)&db=USPAT&type=ids

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