Transaction Checklists: The Magic Pill for Compliance

"Plan your work and work your plan," is a phrase we hear around the RE Technology offices a lot. It's a sage reminder that setting up processes and following set tasks is the most effective way to handle large projects.

It's advice that can greatly simplify real estate transactions for agents, too, and keep brokers in compliance. Having a predetermined set of steps that agents can follow for each of their listings can greatly speed up a transaction's timeline by preventing missed documents and deadlines. This can also boost a brokerage's bottom line. If a transaction closes in 60 days instead of 90, that's 30 extra days of capital in your bank account.

One way that real estate professionals are planning their work and working their plan is via transaction checklists. You may have seen similar checklists for marketing listings in your CRM, but transaction checklists are focused specifically on the steps and documents needed to keep transactions on deadline and compliant.

"With transaction checklists, brokers and administrators can sleep well at night and make sure they have all the needed files, so if something happens, they know they're safe," says Andrew Chishchevoy, founder of Brokermint, a back office and transaction management solution that offers built-in checklists. "That's exactly what brokers say when they talk to us. 'I'm really worried about my business, I have 15 agents, and I want to make sure everything is structured, safe and secure.'"

So what exactly should brokers include in the transaction checklists they build for their firms? Brokermint offered us insight into the items they include in their customizable checklists. Here's an overview.