What software do you find invaluable and why? And which were a waste of money? Would you recommend a smartphone like the Treo 600 or a seperate phone and PDA?

Here's a sample writeup: www.palmone.com/us/solutions/personal/dayinthelife/realestate.html

I particularly like the looks of Pocket Real Estate's software for the Palm but it's not inexpensive: www.pocketrealestate.com

Thank you in advance.

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Jason in Dallas
Telecom Sales and Service Manager
RE license coming soon

Jason,
Here is the software I use with my Palm and which I find invaluble:
1) Microsoft Outlook - Everything that is on my contact manager is synced to my palm. Tasks, Calender, Notes, Email, etc.

2) Documents To GO - This allow Microsoft Word and Excel files to be synced to my palm.

3) Tons of freeware and shareware programs out there. I love the Home Loan program for pre-qualifying.

It wont be long before MLS's will have WAP technology and we can access the database with cell phones. That would eliminate the need for the Pocket Real Estate program. If I need to access the MLS I use my laptop and wireless connection.

I am presently researching a good combination cell/pda that has the capabilities that I have now on my PDA.

Hi all,

I am still in RE School but the final is on Thursday!

However, as a salesperson in another industry, I have found that I want to be on the phone AND researching something on my PDA at the same time. This seems to make the Treo a bit of a problem.

How do you handle the concurrent needs for the device?

Lookin for my license any time now.

I agree with Jim... lots of freeware. Here is a website that is very useful http://www.palmone.com/us/ .

I would also suggest trying to get the insurance if they will sell it to you. The screen on my treo 600 cracked... becomes useless when you can't see the screen. Cingular didn't offer insurance but I think Palm has a new plan. Had to pay $180 to get it fixed. They sent me a temporary replacement and was able to synch everything so i didn't miss a beat.

You can use the speaker phone and access other programs at the same time... not the web while on a call though.

My wife and I each have the TREO 650 and it is great. We both have them synced to are Outlook. It's great because you can check mutiple email accounts on it. Documents to go is very handy. Just buy a good size SD memory card I have have a 512. Don't buy one from Palm they are kind of expensive you can shop around and get it a lot cheaper. The 650 also offers the Bluetooth. I am a newly licensed real estate agent so I haven't really used any of the software that is available. It looks like there is some really handy stuff out there. Probably the coolest software we found for this is a program called PDAnet (available at Palmone.com). It allows you to use the internet service through the phone to surf the internet on your laptop. We have the phones through Sprint and are plan includes unlimited web access. Basically we plug the sync cable into the phone and then connect it to are laptop. Once we do that we just click on PDAnet it you can instantly get on the internet from your laptop. It's just like surfing wireless. Suprisely it is pretty darn fast. It's not a true high speed connection but it is much faster that dial up. I have used it a few times to pull up MLS in front of clients and they are very impressed. My wife is a loan officer so she uses it all the time in front of clients to pull up there credit and also tell them if they are approved or not. Another cool feature with these phones is that it allows you to do true text messaging to other phones. I would also recommend buying the insurance on this phone I have heard they break easily. So far I haven't any problems but I did have the TREO 300 phone a few years ago and broke the screen in two months. One other interesting note when I was at the Sprint store buying my wife's phone the sales guy told me that real estate agents were his biggest buyers of this phone. At the time he didn't know I was an agent.If you have any other questions just let me know.

Mike

You should take a look at RealOrganized products, RealtyJuggler Deluxe has all the capabilities that a realtor would expect in one bundle. 10 modules in all and handles all the client/deal tracking you would expect.

www.realorganized.com