How Much Time Can You Save with a Transaction Management Solution?

Ben Franklin said it best: "Time is money." Ben's sage advice in his essay to young tradesmen rings true 272 years later.

Nearly all real estate software tools available tout that if you use it, it will save you time. But perhaps no other software program can deliver more quantifiable savings of time during your daily workflow than a transaction management program.

Do you use a transaction management program every day? If so, you are maximizing the time savings that this tech tool can deliver.

And you are not alone. According to the National Association of Realtors, one in four Realtors use a transaction management program, like Form Simplicity, every day or nearly every day. Another 21 percent of Realtors use a transaction management program a few times a week.

However, this means that fewer than half of all Realtors are benefiting from the enormous time savings that a transaction management solution offers—especially since current circumstances limit face-to-face interactions today.

Exactly how much time can a transaction management save you? You could easily save 400 to 1,000 hours a year or more.

How?

If you are like most agents, your daily workflow includes a lot of tasks that if you could streamline or create a digital alternative for routine or mundane tasks, you would reap more minutes every day. The time you would save would allow you to concentrate on the things that make your business more profitable.

One of the biggest workflow tasks that can consume time one could label as "wasted" is the time you spend managing a transaction from beginning to close.

To measure how much time you can save if you used a digital process to manage your transactions, think about all the tasks you do today related to each sale. Tasks typically include:

• Completing a Purchase and Sales Agreement: how many times are you entering the same address or inputting standard language?
• Coordination for inspections and appraisals
• Assisting with repair, pest control issues and other corrections
• Scheduling and meeting with clients to sign documents
• Tracking down clients to sign documents with a missed signature or initial
• Picking up or delivering documents from the title firm or closing agent
• Obtaining mortgage lender information and documenting it
• Confirming and documenting a buyer is approved by the mortgage lender
• Following up with lenders regularly to make sure everything is on track
• Preparing and mailing information related to a transaction
• Providing documentation to lenders or to your clients to provide to their lender
• Creating and monitoring a list of tasks in your calendar or scheduler
• Making sure every document has been updated
• Keeping everybody is up-to-date on the status of the transaction
• Traveling and waiting to pick up or deliver documentation
• Finding a particular printed document
• Finding language inside a printed document
• Tracking down homeowners association documents
• Making hard copies of everything for your transaction file

Using a transaction management program like Form Simplicity can save you time with each of these tasks. The total time savings per transaction will depend on the actual transaction. Some deals take more time than others. On average, you should be able to realize at least 40 hours of time savings when you use a transaction management program versus when you don't.

If you average 10 transactions a year, that's a savings of some 400 hours annually.

Going paperless pays

Everything that you did in person changed with the pandemic. And everyone adjusted. Agents already using transaction management software shined. They no longer had to physical meet with clients to obtain a "wet" signature. eSign tools, built into programs like Form Simplicity, solve the in-person contact issues.

eSigning also saved agents with a transaction management program a considerable amount of time. It takes time to schedule a client meeting, travel to the destination, time to meet for the signatures and time to travel back, copy and file everything. If you accidentally missed an initial or a signature, you may as well double the time you have wasted.

And when doing things the old-fashioned way without a digital process, a lot of time you lose may not always be under your control. Without a digital process, you are dependent on the responsiveness of your broker, other agents, title and closing representatives, attorneys, inspectors, lenders, appraisers and more.

However, when you have a transaction management program, you can streamline all of your interactions with everyone in your brokerage as well as third parties, from first contact to follow-up and monitoring. Everything is stored in one place and you have more control to reduce the time you spend on these tasks.

It's safer too

Finally, one more time savings that a transaction management program provides is when something goes wrong. Having an audit on a transaction can be a time consuming and painful process, but it doesn't have to be.

Using a transaction management program can be a lifesaver when you have to show detailed documentation. All correspondence—every email and text—and every document related to the transaction is stored in one place, digitally. Best of all, everything is time stamped, easy to find and provide.

If you still are not using a transaction management program, isn't it time you did? To learn more about Form Simplicity, one of the leading time management programs available nationwide, go to formsimplicity.com.

Tricia Stamper is Director of Technology at Florida Realtors®, which owns and operates Tech Helpline and Form Simplicity.