Discover how this East London agency has cut hours of admin, so its team can spend less time shuffling papers and more time closing deals.
As a self-styled ‘old school’ estate agent, David Epsom isn’t interested in sitting behind a desk doing admin. He’s interested in meeting clients and selling houses.
After all, with 30 years of experience behind him, that’s what he does best.
But like lots of agents, he found himself becoming increasingly bogged down by tedious back office tasks.
As a senior sales negotiator at Churchill Estates in South Woodford, David was spending hours each day battling different online systems to upload listings and chase updates.
“I don’t want to spend my day doing admin, I want to be selling,” David says.
“We’d been using an ancient system called Encore that was really basic. It was clear we needed a more modern solution.”
For Churchill Estates, the solution was Alto.
Old school, new tools
As the UK’s leading CRM for estate agents, Alto brings sales, lettings and compliance into one central system.
It’s built for the way modern estate agents actually run, so it handles everything from listing creation and applicant matching to sales progression, EPC and certificate tracking and client accounting.
For David and his team, one of the standout benefits of switching has been faster, simpler property listing.
With Alto, new listings can be created quickly using AI-assisted tools that help generate polished property descriptions in seconds. Once ready, they can be pushed live instantly through Alto’s seamless integrations with Rightmove, Zoopla and OnTheMarket.
At Churchill Estates, this feature alone has resulted in a saving of hours every day.
David says: “Before, we had to upload everything separately, which was really annoying. Uploading two or three properties to four different websites could easily take all day. Now you just do it once, click a button and it’s done.
“It saves a ridiculous amount of time.”
Keeping deals moving
Sales progression is another area where Alto has made a real difference for Churchill Estates.
With Alto, updates and key milestones like surveys, mortgage offers and contracts are all tracked in one place. There’s no need to search through inboxes or try to piece things together.
It makes it much easier for the team to stay on top of things. Because Alto is cloud-based, everyone can see exactly what’s going on from anywhere, and take action when needed.
There’s also a dedicated portal for clients, which stops a lot of the back-and-forth that can happen otherwise.
David says: “Everything is there and you can see exactly what’s happening straight away. Before, scrolling through all the notes could easily take 10-15 minutes.
“Now, if a solicitor phones I can just say immediately ‘yes, the mortgage offer was received on 24th September’ and then I’m off the phone again and can get on with something else.
“If someone’s off, someone else can pick up easily, which is something we never had before. The property matching is really easy to use too, you just register an applicant and it does the rest.
“It just makes my life so much easier.”
Easy from day one
David got to grips with Alto quickly. The system is designed to be intuitive and easy to use. Rather than bolting AI on as an afterthought, Alto has been rebuilt from the ground up with intelligence built into its workflows, so tasks can be completed quicker as part of the day-to-day.
Getting started is just as straightforward. Most agents are up and running in around 16 days, with onboarding designed to get teams up to speed quickly.
David says: “Once you’re used to it, it’s really straightforward. We recently had a new starter who mastered it in his first week.
“It’s great that everyone can use it on their phones so we aren’t tied to our desks. I have Tuesdays off, but I like being able to open Alto from home and check my diary for the next day.
“It’s a small thing, but it makes a difference.”
‘Alto is a godsend’
While Alto’s smart workflows have transformed how the team works day-to-day, for David it all comes down to something simple: having more time to do the job he loves.
Instead of getting tied up in admin, he’s getting back to why he became an estate agent in the first place, to meet clients and make deals.
David adds: “I’m not an admin man, I’m a salesman. Alto has enabled me to get back to that.
“I don’t think we could be without it now. The idea of manually uploading property listings again doesn’t bear thinking about.
“I’ve been in the game for a long time, and it’s definitely the best estate agent CRM I’ve ever used.
“Alto is a godsend. I’d highly, highly recommend it to anyone.”
Wondering if Alto should be your next move? Book your free, no-obligation demo now.
