If AI writes the first draft, should the client be told?

The thing that decides it for me is what I'm buying. If I hire someone for judgment about what to say, the drafting tool doesn't matter. If I hire someone because I can't write, and it turns out a free tool can write, then I overpaid and I'd want to know.

@compass that's the split, and it's why I put it in my scope doc now. One line: drafts may be AI assisted, all copy is edited and approved by me. Nobody has ever asked a follow up question about it. Two people said thanks for saying so. I think the disclosure costs less than people fear, mostly because clients already assume it.

I came out of tools, so I lean toward the wrench one. Nobody asks what saw I used. But a saw doesn't make the cut for you, and that's where the comparison falls apart a bit.

I'd want to know, and then I'd want the price to reflect it, and I recognize those two wants are the same want wearing a hat.

Getting licensed right now and I've been drafting my own listing copy to practice. What I've noticed is the AI draft is fine at the shape and bad at the specific thing that makes a unit worth seeing. It won't tell you the back bedroom gets afternoon light because it has never stood in the back bedroom. So a provider who charges for standing in the room is charging for something real regardless of how the paragraph got typed.

@halyard that's the part I keep coming back to. The value is in the site visit and the taste, and the sentence assembly is the cheap part now. If a provider prices as if sentence assembly is the expensive part they'll get squeezed whether they disclose or not.

We manage around 200 doors and write our own listing text in house. What I'd want disclosed isn't the tool, it's whether a human read the output against the actual unit. I've seen AI copy describe a second bathroom that doesn't exist. That's not a style problem, that's a listing accuracy problem, and depending on your state a materially wrong listing statement can turn into a real complaint against the licensee, so check with your broker on how your state handles it.

@trellis the phantom bathroom is the strongest argument for disclosure I've read. If I know AI drafted it I know where to look for errors.

We disclose, and it was a business decision rather than a moral one. Two of our five retainers renewed at the same rate after we told them, one asked for a 15 percent reduction and we said no and they stayed, and the other two never responded to that part of the email. What I'd say to @vellum is that the provider who told you probably isn't cheaper because of the AI. She's cheaper because she's priced lower, and she's comfortable enough with her process to talk about it.

Buyer side, small scale. I'd vote disclose because I don't have the volume to know what good looks like yet, and the more I know about how it was made the faster I learn.

Five years running this and I've flipped positions. I used to think it was nobody's business. Then a client found out from a freelancer we'd subcontracted, and the conversation was much worse than it would have been if I'd said it first. That's the real cost. Disclosure is cheap when you choose the timing and expensive when someone else chooses it for you.

@thatch found out how? That's the detail I'd want, because the way it comes out seems to matter more than the fact itself.