Today’s real estate investors and operators will accept nothing less than a sophisticated and technology-driven strategy for deploying capital. They require a complete, purpose-built platform that meets the unique needs of Commercial Real Estate (CRE) investment teams ― regardless of their structure, size, and specialties. Every investment thesis is unique and the teams who execute on them should have a fully configurable, unified technology platform to act as the central hub for deal and relationship management.
Modern CRE deal teams not only understand the importance of a deal management system, but a CRM that tracks all their critical relationships. Key amongst those relationships, from a deal sourcing and origination perspective is that with their brokers. DealCloud helps teams understand which brokers are bringing them the best deals and tiers out those relationships so teams can easily be reminded to reach out on a specific cadence. Firms can track both their firm to brokerage (ex. CBRE) as well as firm to broker (ex. Will Silverman – Eastdil Secured) relationships so they can see the history of their exchanges even if the broker moves on to another firm. This arms them with quantifiable data and the ability to keep those sourcing channels honest by understanding not only how many deals they brought, but how many actually closed and which are yielding the best IRRs, Equity Multiples, etc.
How CRE technology impacts dealmaking
Once you’re actively pursuing a deal, having all your teams’ emails, meeting notes, etc. with broker(s), lender(s), sellers, attorneys, appraisers, and third-party consultants on the transaction in a centralized place helps CRE teams execute efficiently and ensure no due diligence items, or anything else, fall through the cracks. Additionally, CRE firms should maintain a single source of truth for communications between the firm and their capital, LPs, HNWIs, and other key contacts. Tracking their investor preferences along with all the communication pertaining to fundraises, distributions, capital calls, fundraises, and other activities can be managed in DealCloud, giving firms a complete picture of the relationships driving their business.
The DealCloud Outlook Add In is a key feature of the platform that drives value to our clients for CRM, property, asset, and pipeline data management. The DealCloud Outlook Add In leverages both emails and calendar events, giving busy deal professionals the flexibility to add or edit entries from both mediums.
Creating a new deal record in DealCloud from the Outlook Add In will save emails and any file attachments to the newly created deal record and to the contact(s) that sent you the email.
Similarly, the Microsoft Word Add In, and the Microsoft Excel Add In provide robust functionality to drive powerful reporting that benefit all sides of our current Commercial Real Estate clients. Reports are purpose-built during the implementation process, allowing customization and quality that drives value and optimizes the return on the investment.
Using the Word Add In, users can edit or run existing reports or create new ones.
DealCloud understands that many Commercial Real Estate clients require specific formatting, and more complex functionality in “real world” application. To solve for this, many of our CRE clients leverage the Excel Add In, which allows you to access any metric/data point within the system by logging in to DealCloud through Excel and refreshing a sheet to update the data from DealCloud directly. This rings true for formatted Excel sheets as well, which is a huge benefit for analysts scrambling to update the pipeline on Monday morning.
Easily refresh Excel reports as often as you need with one click using the Excel Add In.
DealCloud on-the-go for CRE investors
The mobile application is arguably the most valuable aspect of the DealCloud platform. For busy investment professionals on the go, the app allows ease of data entry, and the ability to quickly add, update, and consume information. To drive even more value, the app also allows users to run Word reports from their device, even while on the golf course. Users can also quickly log notes associated to properties, brokers, and deals. The app allows users to access any firm data stored in DealCloud, on the go, and make it instantly available to the rest of the firm. The app provides the ability to scan a business card to create a new contact (or update the information for an existing contact), and ultimately simplifies the data entry process, and streamlines the data consumption process for busy investment professionals.
In the DealCloud mobile app, users can access all the same functionalities as the desktop version. Above, you can see an example of the Active Deals dashboard.
To learn more about how DealCloud’s state-of-the-art deal and relationship management system built specifically for real estate professionals can help your firm, contact us.