Ask any top performing realtor what their go-to-must-have-can’t-live-without tool is, and chances are they’ll say a great real estate CRM. The only problem is that there are so many on the market that it’s hard to choose the best.
To help you decide, we looked at more than 20 real estate CRMs available today, weeded out the underperforming, and chose the seven best options that top performers should consider.
Our top picks? Contactually, WiseAgent, Freshsales, Follow Up Boss, Realvolve, Ixact Contact and LionDesk. We’ve ranked each on the ten factors that matter most to realtors. Take a look and find out which CRM is right for your business.
Here’s a look at our top seven real estate CRMs:
Real Estate CRM Comparison Table
| Category | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Price | $59 / month | $25 / month | $12 / month | $119/ month | $49 / month | $33 / month | $25 / month |
| Marketing Automation |  |  |  | | | |  |
| Dashboard | | | | | | | |
| Learning Curve | |||||||
| Mobile Experience | | | | | | |
|
| Integrations | |||||||
| SMS texting | |||||||
| Analytics | | | | | | | |
| Pre-Written Content | | | | | | | |
| Customer Support | phone/chat/email | phone/email | chat/email/phone | phone/email | phone/chat/email | phone/chat/email | phone/chat/email |
| Close Score: |
(Swipe right to see full table)
How We Evaluated the Best Real Estate CRMs for 2019
As you can see, we evaluated each of these Real Estate CRMs in ten categories.
Each of these categories (Price, Marketing Automation, Dashboard, Customer Support, Learning Curve, Integrations, SMS Texting, Analytics, Mobile Experience, and Pre-Written Content) get combined with our overall impressions of the platform to yield a Close Score.
Even though a CRM may excel in one category, at the end of the day, the Close Score reflects each platform’s overall impression on us, usability, and generally how warm and fuzzy they make us feel.
Now that we’ve seen a little bit of how these CRMs stack up against each other, let’s dig a little deeper into each one.
Contactually
Close Score: 8 /10
Best for: Realtors With a Large Existing Sphere
Contactually is a CRM that defines itself on helping its users discover the potential business they are missing in their existing sphere of influence. Contactually even goes as far as claiming that most realtors are missing out on up to 30% of the GCI potential from their existing sphere.
Relationship marketing is the priority, and Contactually makes maintaining those relationships easy with excellent automation options and lots of solid integrations. If you are looking for a straightforward CRM that you can use to better your business on day one, Contactually is the CRM for you.
How Much Does Contactually Cost?
Contactually offers three different pricing options, the least expensive being their Professional Plan at $59 per month. There are two other tiers (Accelerator – $99 / month and Concierge at $399 / month), offering a deeper level of coaching and support, as well as advanced analytics and access to a larger library of pre-written material.
Contactually Pricing at a Glance
| Plan Name | ||
|---|---|---|
| Professional | ||
| Accelerator | ||
| Concierge |
Contactually brought up the rear in terms of the cost per user. While we actually think that Contactually is worth the money you spend on it, there are definitely less expensive options available.
What Contactually Does Well
- Email automation: Contactually’s email automation is top notch, and even includes optimal send time analysis so you know the best time to reach each of your contacts.
- Ease of use: Contactually is very easy to navigate, you won’t need a day or three of training before you are actually putting this platform to work for you.
- Relationship Marketing & Accountability: Contactually’s big strength is its relationship marketing initiatives and the ways it helps hold its users accountable to their commitments. Every time you log in to Contactually, you get your “Follow Up Score,” telling you how well you’ve done staying in contact with the people that matter most to your business.
Where Does Contactually Fall Short?
As mentioned before, Contactually isn’t very competitive on price. Yes, they do offer some great features, but there are certainly more affordable options available.
While Contactually offers some integrations through Zapier that allow for SMS texting, the lack of integration into the native platform is noticeable and a missed opportunity. Text message open rates are typically astronomically higher than email, this would be a great communication tool to have.
Contactually Unique Features
We really like the way that Contactually handles your contacts. When you link an email address with Contactually, the platform goes back through your entire email history and builds a profile for anyone you’ve exchanged email with, right down to the average time they are online.
It is a nice bit of insight to include on your contacts, and for a CRM that prides itself on helping you to develop better opportunity within your existing sphere, it really hits the mark.
Contactually will look at what time your contacts typically SEND you email. Using this data, the platform gives you a good idea when each of your peeps are online doing email.
We can all identify with the experience of email that comes in as we are looking at the window, we are much more likely to open it.
If you’re looking for a really in depth look at Contactually, check out our deep-dive review of Contactually here.
Try Contactually
If your sphere of influence isn’t producing the way it should and you are ready to make an investment in fixing it, Contactually is a CRM you should check out. They even have a seven day, full featured free trial so you can take it for a test drive.
Wise Agent
Close Score: 9 / 10
Best for: Marketing Automation
Wise Agent has been in the real estate CRM space for a long time (since 2002!). Even though the look and feel of Wise Agent sometimes reminds us Windows 98, they’ve learned things along the way that make them a valuable platform for realtors.
If you are looking for a CRM with great automation options and 24/7 support included with every package, Wise Agent is for you.
How Much Does Wise Agent Cost?
Wise Agent has a straightforward pricing structure: $29 a month or $299 per year. Both options include a one-on-one onboarding call and round the clock support, 365 days a year.
Wise Agent Pricing at a Glance
| Plan Name | ||
|---|---|---|
| Be a Wise Agent |
Considering the fairly long list of features (great email automation, integration partners and SMS texting to name a few), you get a good bang for your buck with Wise Agent.
What Wise Agent Does Well
- Intuitive Integrations: Wise Agent has a good list of intuitive integrations with other companies like BombBomb to help build out their offerings for communication and lead gathering.
- Data Smart: If you are looking to help make your automation smarter, Wise Agent offers A/B testing in their automatic email responders so you can dial in what your contacts respond to most.
- SMS Texting: With the use of Wise Text, you can include SMS texting in your stable of communication options without ever having to leave the CRM.
Where Does Wise Agent Fall Short?
We know looks aren’t that important. But, honestly, it’s time for a face lift, Wise Agent. This complaint is more than skin deep too. The old school interface is actually a little distracting sometimes because there is so much happening on the screen at once (contacts, calendars, email, etc.)
Wise Agent Unique Features
We know we’ve mentioned this before, but it bears repeating: 24/7 support, 365 days a year, with a real person.
If you have a question about Wise Agent, there is literally always someone ready to answer it.
We wrote an in depth review of Wise Agent if you want to really get under the hood and see how things function, check it out.
Try Wise Agent
If service and support are number one for you, Wise Agent is a great CRM to check out. Their price is very affordable, and you can even try it for free. With a 30-day full featured trial, you can put Wise Agent through its paces and see how it could benefit your business.
Freshsales
Close Score: 7 / 10
Best For: Great Price and Attractive Dashboard
If you know anything about Freshsales, you know that, technically, Freshsales isn’t designed SPECIFICALLY for realtors. That is typically a disqualifier for us; we want platforms that have the targeted needs of our industry front and center.
However, Freshsales manages to hit on those needs nicely. Freshsales is also priced very attractively, and their built in phone integration makes convenience a selling point for this platform too.
If you are looking for a CRM where price and simplicity win the day, you should check out Freshsales.
How Much Does Freshsales Cost?
Freshsales’ Free Forever plan (also called Sprout) is just that: FREE. Your features are limited at this level, but there are improvements that could be made to your business from it.
Beyond that, there are four tiers of pricing starting at $12 per month where the capabilities of this platform really start to take off.
Freshsales Pricing at a Glance
| Plan Name | ||
|---|---|---|
| Sprout | ||
| Blossom | ||
| Garden | ||
| Estate | ||
| Forest |
With their $12 per month plan (called Blossom), users get full email, phone, workflow automation, access to the Freshsales integration options, and more. The upper three levels; Garden for $25 per month, Estate for $49 per month, and Forest for $79 per month continue to expand and enhance these areas, as well as provide more comprehensive customer support.
What Freshsales Does Well
- Let’s Get Visual: The Freshsales dashboard and interface are super clean and accessible, making it the platform of choice from a straight up and down visual perspective. We wish other real estate CRMs would take the time to make their interfaces as nice as Freshsales’.
- Calling Made Easy: Having a dialer BUILT IN to the CRM is a game changer for agents who spend a lot of time prospecting on the phone. There is a small cost for FreshCaller, but it is worth it.
- Flexible Pricing: Freshsales has so many different offerings as far as pricing and add ons, it is easy to start small and scale your use of the platform as your business grows, both in volume and team.
Where Does Freshsales Fall Short?
Freshsales offers a wide variety of tools to get the job done, and despite how attractive it is, the dashboard isn’t as intuitive as we’d like. It can take a little while to really get the hang of working in this space.
Also, even though there are some handy integrations with other arms of the FreshWorks company, Freshsales does not natively integrate with other companies that work in the real estate sphere. You can always try your luck with Zapier integrations, but it would be nice to have more real estate integrations fresh out of the box.
Freshsales Unique Features
Freshsales has some reporting options that can be really helpful if you are working on a team or if you prefer a visual interpretation of your data. Since Freshsales is more of a generic sales CRM, many of these reports don’t feel geared towards our industry specifically. But they are still helpful, and for those who need to see a graph rather than read a table, they can be a good tool.
Also, Freshsales is part of a larger suite of sales tools, so once you master Freshsales, if you are finding your business offerings are lacking in another area (say, marketing or live customer chat?), you can expand your FreshWorks footprint. Our favorite add on is Freshchat, perfect for providing an easy live chat option on your website.
Try Freshsales
If having a fully loaded CRM that can grow along with your business is important to you, and you don’t mind a bit of a learning curve, you should check out Freshsales. Freshsales offers a 30-day free trial to see if this platform is right for you.
Follow Up Boss
Close Score: 9 / 10
Best For: Teams
For more and more realtors, the path to success includes being part of a team. There are lots of real estate CRMs that accomodate team needs with a tool here or there. Follow Up Boss trumps those add-ons with a platform designed specifically for teams.
Follow Up Boss prioritizes lead and contact organization with a team in mind, and makes marketing and outreach trackable and assignable.
If you are the leader of a team or even a brokerage, Follow Up Boss should be on your radar.
How Much Does Follow Up Boss Cost?
Follow Up Boss looks pricey compared to their competitors, but you get multiple users per account.
The base level package (“Team”) allows three users with a per user cost starting at $39.66. Jumping up to five users (“Established”) knocks that price down to $31.80 per month.
The larger plans (“Growth” and “Expansion”) allow 10 and 25 users and clock in at $23.90 and $15.96 per user, respectively.
Follow Up Boss Pricing at a Glance
| Plan Name | ||
|---|---|---|
| Team (up to 3 users) | ||
| Established (up to 5 users) | ||
| Growth (up to 10 users) | ||
| Expansion (up to 25 users) |
Regardless of how many members are on your team, you get the full capability of Follow Up Boss.
What Follow Up Boss Does Well
- Marketing Automation: Follow Up Boss’ options for automating and streamlining your marketing tasks are robust. There is no such thing as (good) attention-free marketing, but we definitely see a lot less work on a day to day basis required with Follow Up Boss.
- Integrations: Follow Up Boss’ integrations list is long and native. Not to say there is anything wrong with using Zapier to connect the dots, but these native integrations are thoughtful and intentional, making them easier to use.
- Use on Day One: We were up and running on Follow Up Boss, actually using it for its intended purpose on day one. We didn’t need a major tutorial to start working, and the interface is relatively self-explanatory right out of the box.
Where Does Follow Up Boss Fall Short?
Follow Up Boss is a team tool, plain and simple. While we love the team experience it provides, it doesn’t offer much in the way of solutions for Realtors who are operating as a one man or woman show. The price point disqualifies it as an option for most Realtors who aren’t part of a team.
Follow Up Boss Unique Features
We talked a little about the integrations of Follow Up Boss, but one specific one stands out; the native link with Bomb Bomb. As the go-to video mail tool, Bomb Bomb has carved out a unique offering in the Email space. Follow Up Boss includes a Bomb Bomb button right in the Email composition window.
Follow Up Boss also includes unlimited SMS texting with every single plan. With open rates of well over 95%, texting is an extremely effective form of communication. A CRM with unlimited in-app texting (and the tracking to make it a part of your contact’s communication profile) definitely has our attention.
Want to know even more about Follow Up Boss? We don’t blame you, it is pretty interesting stuff. Check out our full review of Follow Up Boss to learn even more.
Try Follow Up Boss
If you’re team looking for a product designed especially for you, Follow Up Boss is definitely the best choice. With a 14 day free trial, teams can put Follow Up Boss through its paces and decide it it’s right for them.
Realvolve
Close Score: 8 / 10
Best For: Realtors Who Want Lots of Customization
End-to-end solutions for Realtors are a popular topic right now. There is a lot of conversation around providing a platform that does EVERYTHING under the sun.
The problem with this in the CRM world is that, often times, those massive solutions provide answers to questions an agent isn’t even asking. Thus, there winds up being some wasted space (and dollars) in a CRM.
Realvolve isn’t like that. The Realvolve approach is to do the basics really well, and provide agents lots of opportunities to take those basics and customize their workflows to the Nth degree.
How Much Does Realvolve Cost?
Realvolve’s pricing depends on the number of users. A single user is going to pay $49 / month if paid annually. Jump up to five users and each will pay a little over $33 / month (paying annually). Ten users or more pay a little over $23 / month (paying annually).
Realvolve Pricing at a Glance
| Plan Name | ||
|---|---|---|
| Pro (1 user) | ||
| Pro Plus (5 users) | ||
| Team (10 users) | ||
| Large Team (15 users) |
Something we love about the Realvolve pricing model is the inclusion of an assistant account for every single plan. We all know that without the admins in our business, we would fall apart very quickly. Realvolve knows this too, which is why that assistant account is standard across all options.
What Realvolve Does Well
- A Workflow For Everything: Realvolve provides automation options for just about every task across the platform. Not limited to Email drip campaigns, you can automate text messages, mailer campaigns, even paperwork for your team.
- Dashboard Design: The Realvolve dashboard is image forward and informative, making it easy to see at a glance what’s happening in your business. But, it is also very customizable, giving users the option to see only the information that is pertinent to their success.
- Library of Material: Most CRMs will talk about their pre-written Emails templates or even text messages, all of which Realvolve has. Where Realvolve takes this a step further is in providing a robust library of workflows, making all sorts of great suggestions on how you can use their tools to automate your work day.
Where Does Realvolve Fall Short?
For some reason, Realvolve is missing the native integration with Google Calendar to bring your G-suite appointments front and center in the CRM. There is a Zapier integration to get the job done, but it does require a little bit of massage to get into place.
Also, as much as we love the workflows, Realvolve lacks a clear visualization of their building process. Dragging and dropping would be so helpful here, but alas, not an option.
Realvolve Unique Features
It bears repeating, the assistant account included in every Realvolve CRM purchase is amazing. You need your admin plugged into everything happening on your CRM, and Realvolve makes that happen easily.
The Realvolve dashboard is more like a bulletin board for your office. The widgets there are (for the most part) moveable, making the frustration of items not appearing in the order you want them a thing of the past.
We’ve taken a look at Realvolve in the past. Head over to our complete review to really dig into what Realvolve is all about if you are interested in learning more.
Try Realvolve
Realvolve is a great CRM for the essential tasks that Realtors value above all others. It is highly customizable and puts you in control of your CRM’s workflow, instead of the other way around. With a 14 day free trial, Realtors can try the platform for themselves and see what they think.
Ixact Contact
Close Score: 7 / 10
Best For: New Agents
Ixact Contact gets us a step closer to that all in one Realtor solution we’ve been wondering about for a while. While they aren’t quite there (nobody is), they have inched in front of their competitors with a robust CRM that also includes options for an IDX website and social media content.
How Much Does Ixact Contact Cost?
IXACT CONTACT OFFERS A SIX MONTHS OF THEIR SERVICE FOR FREE TO ANY AGENT WHO HAS BEEN LICENSED LESS THAN A YEAR.
Let that sink in for a moment. If you are a new agent in the industry, Ixact Contact is giving away their service to you. This is a singular offer in the CRM game, nobody has anything like it.
Now that we’ve got the shouting out of the way, the rest of Ixact Contact’s pricing model is intriguing, and there is a lot to unpack here. They offer an ala carte price option for Realtors so you aren’t paying for services you don’t need.
- Basic version for a single user of the CRM + an agent website : $33 / month
- IDX Website Add-ons: $13 / month (standard), $33 / month (professional) + $65.00 set up fee
- Add team members : $23 / month, per team member
- Additional IDX Websites : Starting at $13 / month + $65 set up fee
- Social Stream : $20 / month
- Mass Emailing : varies by volume
What Ixact Contact Does Well
- Designed with Intent: We love the way Ixact Contact users don’t have to play a guessing game about features. For instance, your pipeline tool doesn’t have some silly made up name, it is just called Business Pipeline.
- Social Media Smarts: Ixact Contact is constantly searching the web for publicly available social media info about your contacts and populates that information right in their profile. This is a very helpful feature if relationship marketing is your forte.
- Bulk Mail and Postcards: Working the mailbox at the end of the driveway is still a strategy that a lot of Realtors use, but seems conspicuously absent from most CRMs. Ixact Contact’s Letters and Labels function allows for mass mailings to be done from your CRM.
Where Does Ixact Contact Fall Short?
Ixact Contact’s list of integrations is noticeably small. Granted, this platform does a lot of the things that other CRMs rely on outside help for, but with less than a dozen partners, you really have limited options for playing with others.
Also, we’d love to see some SMS texting in app. We all know how much higher open rates are on texts versus Emails, so having this option would be a nice asset.
Ixact Contact Unique Features
Obviously, we are pretty geeked about the free six months to new Realtors. If you somehow missed that above, Ixact Contact offers their CRM FOR FREE to any agent who has been licensed for less than a year. Nobody else is doing this, and if you are a new Realtor looking for a quality CRM, you can get one. FOR FREE.
Also, the Social Stream option adds another level of service to this CRM that the others in the space just aren’t providing. It isn’t original content, but it is a lot of relevant articles from reputable sources like Huffington Post and Better Homes and Gardens that will actually be interesting to your contacts.
We’ve got a full review of Ixact Contact if you want to dig a little deeper. Check it out.
Try Ixact Contact
Ixact Contact is easy to try. If you are looking for a CRM with an IDX website component, something with some social options, or, gosh darn it, SOMETHING FREE, you should give Ixact Contact a go. They also offer a five week free trial to really kick the tires, so you don’t have anything to lose here.
LionDesk
Close Score : 7 / 10
Great For : Existing CRM Users Who Want a Change
As Realtors, of course we love to be the first person in to list a home for sale. But, being the second agent in isn’t a bad place to be either. In fact, often times, that is great. You learn from the mistakes of the guy before you and can come out firing on all cylinders for what your client really needs.
Liondesk is a lot like this. If you have a CRM that you’ve been using for a while and aren’t feeling satisfied with, LionDesk is a breath of fresh air. They don’t try to be everything to everyone, and the things they do tackle they do very well.
How Much Does LionDesk Cost?
LionDesk offers two plans: $25 and $49 per month. The $25 per month plan is robust and full of features; you won’t find yourself lacking in capability. The upgrade to the $49 plan includes add-ons like the Text2Sell feature, a dedicated local phone number, and video texting.
LionDesk Pricing at a Glance
| Plan Name | ||
|---|---|---|
| Pro | ||
| Pro Plus |
What LionDesk Does Well
- Learning Curve: LionDesk easy to use straight out of the gate. We got started on making LionDesk work for us in less than an hour, and already saw its potential for efficiency in our business.
- Bulk Texting: Sending all the contacts on a specific list an Email message is a powerful tool, but this is something most CRMs offer. Wouldn’t it be great if someone offered that same tool, but on a platform where the open rates are typically over 95%? Sounds great. LionDesk offers that.
- Customizable Fields: We know this is a little thing, but it turns out it is massively helpful. Being able to create custom fields in a contact profile lets you add the details about your contact only you or your team know about.
Where Does LionDesk Fall Short?
While we appreciate that LionDesk strives to have as much information as possible available to users whenever possible, the occasional side-effect of this effort is the feeling of clutter. It isn’t a consistent issue throughout the user experience, but it does happen.
LionDesk’s transaction management and pipeline area doesn’t offer a ton of added value. We get it, the spot where LionDesk truly shines is in the cultivation of your leads to get them to the contract stage, but it would be nice to have a few more capabilities after money hits escrow.
LionDesk Unique Features
Automated marketing is pretty standard fare for a CRM, but LionDesk takes this feature a step further than most by offering Blended Campaign Automation. Instead of just being able to send scheduled mass Email, you can add texts, videos, even prompts to make calls with certain scripts to your workflows.
LionDesk’s Text2Sell feature provides a second level of service for things like sign riders. Take the LionDesk assigned phone number, put it on a sign rider in front of your new listing, and tell people to text for more information. When prospective buyers text that number, LionDesk automatically sends that person back the packet of information you’ve prepared for them. An extra level of hands off automation frees you up to speak to buyers who are a little further down the funnel.
We’ve picked through LionDesk with a fine toothed comb and written a full review of it. Check it out if you want our full take on this platform.
Try LionDesk
There are lots of things to like about LionDesk. Mixed automation, a customizable interface and graduated texting options make LionDesk worth your time to at least try. LionDesk offers a 30 day full featured trial, no credit card required. If you are ready for change in the CRM space, or in need of your first CRM, LionDesk is a good option.
Bringing it All Together
With so many different business models, philosophies, and Realtor types out there, it is easy to see why there are so many different real estate CRMs. Which of these seven is right for you? Is there a real estate CRM that we need to add to our guide?
Drop a comment below, tell us about your favorite CRM. Is it on this list? How did it change the way that you do business?
Fantastic post! You won’t see this on Inman. Too many sacred cows.
Interesting that WiseAgent gets a 9/10 with no mobile experience. Will have to dig into all of these deeper when I have some more time. I hear that LionDesk is working on a version 2.0. That should be interesting.
Will definitely post a link to this on some FB groups.
Thanks for your thoughts Roland. Yes, a deeper dig is definitely in order, the CRM game is changing quickly right now! LionDesk has some interesting partnerships in the works that we will be covering here in the future, they are making some pretty serious strides towards being the leader of the pack. We will definitely be watching that development closely.