Real estate pricing: launch price list and dynamic prices

A developer has hundreds of units, and each one is worth something different. A plot next to the woods costs more than one by the road, an apartment with a view costs more than one facing the courtyard, and the top floor sells differently from the second. The price is a base rate per square foot or per plot, plus adjustments for everything buyers value.

Then the price starts to move. Some units sell in a week, others sit for months. If you never touch the price, the project loses money twice: underpriced units go too fast, and the weak ones sit and lock up revenue.

That is why real estate pricing is not a price list file but a process: launch, watch demand, decide, control discounts. The pricing module in Smart plan is currently in closed testing, while the tools for each step are already live: the price list, change history, demand analytics and discount analytics.

Real estate pricing software is not there to do the thinking for you. It makes sure the price you decided on reaches every channel at once, and shows you what that decision led to.

These methods are not mutually exclusive. Usually the launch price list is built on a pricing matrix and then adjusted based on demand.

Here is what it looks like in practice. In a housing community you take a base price per plot unit, add a premium for plots by the woods or water, and a discount for plots near the entrance or power lines. After a month of sales you see that corner plots went first while mid-street plots are sitting. So you raise the corner premium for the next phase and run a promotion with an end date on the mid-street plots.

In an apartment complex the logic is the same, only the adjustments differ: floor, view, orientation, layout. The matrix must not contradict itself: an apartment with a worse view should not cost more than the one next door with a better view. When prices live in one system, such errors show up on the availability chart right away.

• Launch price. A base rate per square foot or plot plus factors for size, location, view and floor. Calculated once before sales open.
• Pricing matrix. A table of adjustments: by floor and view in an apartment complex, by street and distance from the entrance or woods in a community. It keeps prices consistent between similar units.
• Stage-based increases. The price rises as construction progresses: excavation, shell, completion. Buyers see that waiting doesn't pay.
• Pace-based pricing. If units sell faster than planned, raise the price; if slower, hold it or run a promotion.
• Dynamic pricing for real estate developers. Decisions for each group of units are based on demand data: views, leads, reservations and how fast similar units sell.
• Time-limited promotions. Special terms on a phase or a specific unit that switch on by date and switch off on their own.

Every step happens in one system, on the same data as your storefront and your sales team.

• Upload units and launch prices, by hand or from an Excel spreadsheet. You can adjust any unit's price with a premium or discount and note the reason.
• Publish the site plan or availability chart on your website and the listing export to portals. The price is the same everywhere.
• Watch demand: the heat map on the site plan and availability chart shows which units people look at and which ones get inquiries.
• Watch inventory and pace: what is left by group, how fast it sells and how much has gone to discounts.
• Change prices in bulk by phase, size or status. The history shows who changed what and when, and a mistake can be rolled back.

Discounts are the fastest way to lose margin. In Smart plan each role has its own limit: for example, a lower one for sales reps and a higher one for the sales manager. A discount above the limit goes for approval, and the manager sees what is left of the margin before signing off.

Each project has a change history: who changed what. If someone accidentally repriced a hundred units, the change can be undone, and you see in advance what will be restored. And if more than 20 records are changed at once, admins get an alert right away.

• Discount limits by role, with approval above the limit.
• Bulk repricing by phase, size or status.
• A separate price for each listing portal: premium, discount or promotion.
• A PDF price list built from current prices and statuses.
• Discount analytics: how much was given, who gave it and what sold above list price.

A community selling plots for private homes: hundreds of similar plots that differ by size, location and neighbors. A pricing matrix by street and the demand heat map show which plots are underpriced.

A housing community with homes: the price is the plot plus the house. The price list can show a row for each plot-and-house pair with the total price.

An apartment complex: prices by floor, view and layout, stage-based increases as construction progresses, separate units for parking and storage. For a developer with several projects it matters that discount rules and history work the same way across all of them.

For the head of sales this means control: you see who gives which discounts, which units are stuck and what each promotion costs. For sales reps it means clear rules: they know their limit and don't wait for a reply in a messenger, but send the discount for approval in one click.

An Excel price list is easy to calculate but hard to apply. Every change has to reach the website, the portals, the sales reps and the proposals, and somewhere it will get stuck.

Excel is still handy for a draft. You can export units to a spreadsheet, work out a new matrix and upload it back, with a premium or discount and a reason for each unit. The difference is that once uploaded, the price works everywhere immediately instead of waiting to be copied over by hand.

Demand data comes from your storefronts: the site plan and availability chart on your website, plus leads and reservations in the CRM. If you manage leads in Bitrix24 or amoCRM, you can connect them, and a reservation in the CRM updates the unit status automatically.

Price is linked to the financial model: if discounts eat into a phase's margin, you see it in the budget. The same price goes to Cian, Avito, Domclick and Yandex Realty with the next export and into sales proposals and price lists.

A person always makes the pricing decision. The system calculates, shows and keeps the history, but never changes prices on its own.

Buyers see an honest price too. When a unit is reserved or sold, it changes color on the website and is removed from the portal listing with the next export. That means fewer calls about units that are gone, and fewer disputes over a price someone saw in an old price list.