Best Real Estate CRM Software in 2024

Read our full CRM methodology and see how we test and review products.

Salesforce is a widely known CRM solution. In fact, it came out on top as the most commonly used CRM among our survey respondents. Salesforce is built for teams that want to store a large amount of customer data. For example, you can create detailed customer profiles that include lead scoring, activity tracking, notes and more.

View of a Salesforce contact profile

Our main takeaway from using the Salesforce free trial was that the user interface was a bit unwieldy. It was difficult to know where to go to find certain features on our own. However, Salesforce representatives were proactive about reaching out to us to offer help once they saw that we had signed up. Plus, customer support is readily available via phone and chat. Regardless of your comfort level with CRM software, Salesforce will likely come with a learning curve.

While monday.com doesn’t offer a CRM that’s specific to real estate, the level of customization in its sales CRM platform can make it work for real estate professionals. When we first opened the platform, we noticed the “start from scratch” option. You can use this if you have a specific vision for organizing your tasks, leads and deals. You can also select which views you want to use to visualize your workflow.

View of a custom monday.com board with tasks organized into groups

That being said, contact management may be tricky with monday.com if you have a long list of clients. You can import your existing contacts in bulk, but clicking into the individual contact entries only shows activity that you add manually. 

Another limitation comes with messaging these contacts. Mass messaging is only available with the Pro and Enterprise plans. Even then, you’re limited in how you can customize the messages, how many you can send and other parameters. Therefore, you may need to integrate with other tools, such as email or SMS software, to carry out your marketing efforts.

HubSpot is our pick if you’re looking for an all-in-one tool to streamline your marketing and sales efforts. Though it’s not specific to real estate, it has a ton to offer if you’re willing to put in the time to customize it. We found the initial setup process to be intuitive, especially when it came to creating a sales pipeline and setting up marketing channels.

You can define the stages of your sales process, add your deals to the platform and tie them to one of the stages. You can also create and manage email, text, social media and advertising campaigns within the platform.

View of the setup flow for the HubSpot deal pipeline

The meeting and calendar features also stood out to us. You can send your availability to a client and then schedule a meeting once you have agreed on a date and time. You can also sync your Google or Outlook calendar. 

The obvious downside to HubSpot is the same one that the other general CRMs had. Because it wasn’t created with real estate in mind, it’s going to take some time to customize it to your specific needs.

Zoho CRM is another general CRM software that you can tailor to your real estate needs. Starting with the deal tracking interface, it was one of the most intuitive ones we encountered, with the ability to filter and change the view to look at the deals from different angles.

Custom views of the Zoho CRM deal tracking dashboard

We also liked Zoho’s built-in communication features. With SalesInbox, you can configure your inbox to organize and filter messages based on customer data. For instance, you could have separate sections for leads, contacts involved in active deals and contacts not involved in active deals. Another feature is the call scheduler, which puts upcoming calls with clients on your calendar so that you don’t forget about them. 

Even after testing all of these useful and unique features, it was still clear to us that Zoho CRM is designed for general sales. Any real estate agent who uses it would have to do some investigating and tinkering to figure out how to customize it to their needs.

Pipedrive is another provider on our list that isn’t specific to real estate, but its in-depth contact information pages would work well for managing real estate clients. Each client entry includes a timeline of all logged activities, so you can keep track of touch points you have had with them and leave notes or reminders to come back to.

View of a Pipedrive customer activity timeline

Another feature we liked during our test drive of the platform was the activities tab. Here, you can see an overview of your tasks, such as calling a client, scheduling a showing or drafting an offer.

The capabilities of Pipedrive mostly stop there. You can visualize your sales pipeline and track your client interactions, but you need another tool for communicating with your clients. That is why we recommend it for beginners because it is a natural next step from storing your contacts in a spreadsheet.

Market Leader is a CRM platform for real estate agents with a specific focus on marketing. One of the most unique parts of this platform is its ability to connect to your website to track and respond to client behavior. For example, you can navigate to a client’s profile to see what properties on your website they have viewed or favorited and then use this information to fine-tune what you send them in your email listing alerts.

Source: Market Leader Professional Recorded Demo

View of a Market Leader client profile with favorited and viewed properties

When we reached out for a demo, the Market Leader team sent over a video overview of the platform’s main features. The video showed that all new leads that come in from an agent’s website get added to the contact list and tagged as “New.” You can then manually update the tag to organize contacts based on where they are in the sales process. However, customization of your contact list mostly stops there. There are limited custom fields, tags and other means for  deciding how your contact list appears.

Wise Agent is another real estate CRM that made our list for its user-friendly tools that can help organize properties. When we tested the free trial of Wise Agent, we noticed how in-depth the property information cards were. There are spots to add descriptions for each room of the property. You can even store the lockbox codes here.

View of the Wise Agent property dashboard

The leads feature is also worth noting, considering how many ways there are to capture and store them. For instance, you can create sign-up forms and landing pages within the platform to use across your website, emails and other communications.

However, outside of connecting these lead sources, integrations are limited. The main ones we noticed were Mailchimp, Constant Contact and Facebook. Additionally, Wise Agent is also limited in terms of customizing and visualizing the sales pipeline.

Top Producer is another real estate CRM. During our testing, its listing management features stood out to us for being both extensive and intuitive. We found out that properties live under the transaction tab. They are organized by listings and closings, with each one being attributed to a contact in the system.

View of the Top Producer transactions dashboard

We also noticed several unique marketing tools. For one, you can send listing alerts directly from the platform. There is also an AI-powered Smart Targeting tool that determines the top 20% of homeowners in an area that are most likely to sell, contacting them to bring in new leads.

In terms of shortcomings, reporting and emailing are limited with Top Producer. You can see basic sales pipeline statistics, such as the number of contacts in each category, but you can’t get in-depth reports. The same is true with emailing. The platform can send basic emails, but it can’t create automated email campaigns.

Top Real Estate CRM Features

Contact Management

Interaction Tracking and Task Management

Interaction tracking is the part of the CRM where you manage how and when you communicate with your customers. Having an activity timeline to look back on can tell you what has and hasn’t worked well in the past so that you can plan your future interactions. Tangentially related, task management is where you organize your calls, emails, meetings and other to-do list items. 

Most of the CRM platforms we tested have general tabs to look at interaction tracking and task management at a high level. They also have a way to go into each contact listing to see what tasks and activities relate to them. This helps ensure that no customers slip through the cracks.

Task ManagementActivity TrackingLionDesk✅✅Market Leader❌✅Wise Agent✅✅Top Producer✅❌monday.com✅❌Zoho CRM✅✅Pipedrive✅✅HubSpot✅✅Salesforce✅✅

Integrations

Pipeline Visualization

Your sales pipeline is a workflow that contains the stages contacts go through as they interact with and buy from you. In most CRM platforms, you can customize your pipeline, deciding what stages to put in it. You can then organize your contacts and leads based on what stage they’re in. 

After setting up your pipeline, you want a way to visualize it. Having a visual can help you understand how quickly clients are moving through the pipeline, what issues are blocking sales from moving forward and other details that you can use to fine-tune your CRM strategy. Most CRMs have at least one visualization, such as a Kanban board or a Gantt chart. Real estate CRMs usually offer fewer views to choose from than general sales CRMs. 

Sales Pipeline Visualization Multiple View OptionsLionDesk✅❌Market Leader❌❌Wise Agent✅❌Top Producer❌❌monday.com✅✅Zoho CRM✅✅Pipedrive✅✅HubSpot✅✅Salesforce✅✅

Additional Considerations for Evaluating Real Estate CRM

There are many other factors — besides typical features — to keep in mind as you’re choosing a real estate CRM. Some secondary considerations include AI, customer support and ease of use.

AI Features

Artificial intelligence is top of mind for professionals in every industry. In our recent survey, over 90% of respondents said that AI tools are either a somewhat or very important part of a CRM’s feature set. 

Consider what AI-powered tools might be able to streamline some of your daily tasks. Here’s a quick breakdown of the AI tools from the providers on our list to get you thinking:

CRM PlatformAI ToolWhat It DoesLionDeskLionDesk Lead Assist ToolSends automated responses to client textsMarket Leader––Wise AgentWise Agent AI BotSends automated follow-ups to leadsTop ProducerAI Smart Targeting ToolDetermines likely sellers in your areamonday.commonday AIComposes emails, summarizes call transcripts, generates project tasksZoho CRMZia AI AssistantScrapes the internet to fill in missing information in contact fields, suggests the best times to contact leadsPipedriveAI Sales AssistantTracks email opens, sends activity reminders, suggests updates to contact dataHubSpotHubSpot AIGenerates emails, makes sales forecastsSalesforceEinstein AIGenerates emails and summaries, creates customized plans

Customer Support

In our survey, customer support was ranked the third most important CRM factor after customization and unique features (e.g., AI tools). Because Salesforce and other complex CRM systems have a steep learning curve, access to customer support is essential for any questions you may have during onboarding. 

Consider what contact methods (e.g., phone, email, chat) you would like access to. Also think about the hours of those channels. For example, are they available 24/7 or just during business hours? Keep in mind that availability usually depends on the plan you choose.

Reporting and Analytics

Many realtor CRMs lack the advanced reporting capabilities that general sales CRMs have. However, they sometimes track unique, property-specific metrics, such as commission reporting and forecasting. In terms of setting up the reporting dashboard, you want to look for customization. You should be able to add the charts, graphs and metrics you want to track.

Workflow and Lead Automation

One of the biggest reasons to implement CRM software is to automate processes to save time on administrative tasks. For CRMs with marketing features, such as HubSpot, you can usually automate when and what messages get sent. Additionally, many CRM tools can connect to or create lead sources. For example, they can create a sign-up form that you put on your website and then pull in any leads that use that form.

The process for setting up these automations varies for each tool, so user-friendliness is something to keep in mind as well. But, in many cases, some tinkering to set up automated processes can save you a ton of time and effort overall.

Ease of Use

Ultimately, the best CRM software for you is the one that you know how to use. Even if a platform has a ton of features, they’re only going to be helpful if you know how to navigate the interface to find and use them. Generally speaking, CRMs with robust feature sets tend to be more difficult to use than ones with basic features. However, you will want to test that theory by signing up for a free trial, plan or demo to see if that’s the case with the CRM you’re considering.

Bottom Line

A CRM can make all the difference for real estate agents and brokers. The right one can help you manage customer data, track to-do items and strengthen client relationships. 

Choosing a CRM requires some research. We have started that process for you by testing and ranking popular providers. LionDesk came out on top thanks to its user-friendly platform and huge feature set designed specifically for real estate professionals. Other real estate providers include Wise Agent for organizing leads, Market Leader for communicating with clients and Top Producer for managing property listings. 

There are also general sales CRMs that you can customize to work for your real estate business. Monday.com and Zoho CRM are two of them that offer extensive customization. Pipedrive, HubSpot and Salesforce also made the list for being robust.

How We Test the Best CRM for Real Estate

Customer relationship management (CRM) tools help businesses bring in new customers and nurture current ones. With different businesses come different business goals and CRM needs. So, the MarketWatch Guides team spent over 100 hours evaluating 13 providers to determine who each CRM is best for. We looked at big names, such as Salesforce and monday.com, as well as small providers, including Liondesk and Less Annoying CRM.

We conducted a survey in 2024 of 200 professionals who were currently using CRM or had used CRM within the past year. We analyzed the results of this survey to determine the following rating criteria:

User Experience (15%)

Features (30%)

Pricing (30%)

Customer Support (15%)

Reputation and Credibility (10%)

Visit the full CRM methodology page for more details on our rating system.