The goggles were strapped to my face like a scuba mask. Only instead of fish, a studio apartment was wavering in my field of vision.

I moved forward, trying to enter the bathroom. Feeling slightly seasick, I hit the wall. This was embarrassing. I tried again and smacked into the door frame.

“Are you teleporting?” asked Jason Darcy, a data scientist and software engineer who works for Halstead Property.

I’d come to Halstead’s Manhattan headquarters to test the virtual reality technology that the company is developing. I’d already perused a 400-square-foot West Village resale using a Samsung Gear headset.