After more than a decade in the oil and gas industry, Richie Whitworth accepted an opportunity to help his brother-in-law build and launch a national brokerage headquartered in Fort Worth, TX. Together, with four other partners, they launched Trinity Real Estate Investment Services (REIS) in September of 2017.
Initially, the small team cobbled together their own CRM using the Microsoft Dynamics platform but quickly realized it was too cumbersome and complex for their needs. As the brokerage scaled, they no longer had time to manage the software and needed a better solution.
“The whole point of having a CRM, for us, is to have support,” he says. “Managing that communication and deal flow is critical, and we needed an option that worked well right out of the box.”
After plenty of research, a fellow Trinity REIS partner discovered Buildout CRM (formerly REthink).
“There were two or three options that we really liked,” Richie says. “And Buildout CRM was the closest to what we needed and required the least amount of effort on our end.”
Because Buildout CRM is built on the Salesforce platform, it offers robust dealmaking functionality without the headache of managing a complicated interface. And because it’s built specifically for the commercial real estate industry, Richie and his team didn’t have to develop and customize the solution from scratch—something he says they were careful to avoid.
After a seamless data migration, the Buildout team provided hands-on training to ensure the Trinity REIS team was making the most of their investment ahead of the launch in Q3 of 2019. And since then, the team has been managing their rapidly growing deal pipeline with ease.
“One victory for me is being able to quickly make changes to the look and feel of pages and easily building processes and workflows,” Richie says.
But, perhaps most importantly, the platform has scaled with the brokerage. Since launching the CRM, the company has doubled in headcount and grown substantially in volume. “Buildout CRM has been a critical piece in our growth,” Richie says. “Not a hindrance.”
In 2020, Buildout acquired REthink, but Richie noted that he and his team didn’t experience any disruptions in service during this process. In fact, Trinity REIS was also a Buildout customer before the acquisition, and Richie says they look forward to exploring the benefits of integrating the two platforms.
“Buildout reps have always been very responsive. If we've had issues—and we've had a couple of sensitive things come up—they were always very quick to address our needs,” Richie says. “I always say, ‘If you’re looking for something that’s straightforward and works great right out of the box, you need Buildout CRM.”