Don't Mistake Dropbox For a Real Estate Document Management System

Matt Cohen brings us this post from his Clareity Consulting blog.

Recently, I've heard some brokers and agents talking about using Dropbox for managing all their real estate documents. I'm glad they are learning about new tools on the Internet, but this is a situation where a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing. Don't get me wrong - I love Dropbox for sharing photos with friends and family, but it should not be mistaken for a real estate business solution. A few of my MLS and broker clients are getting asked by their agents, "Why are we paying for document management when there's Dropbox?" Here's the answer.

Dropbox is a useful document repository for casual sharing, but it is not a document management system. Real estate document management systems do things that Dropbox just doesn't. Document management systems let you control access to what you share; to individuals, teams, offices, regions, companies, settlement service providers and consumers, who all need different and precise levels of access to that content. Access control is critical when dealing with sensitive consumer and company information. The newly announced and rather expensive "Dropbox for Teams" may provide a limited amount of this capability, but we will have to see how good a fit it actually is. Comments and changes to documents can also come from people who aren't the core system users, and Dropbox doesn't provide logins for non-team members. A true document management system can help you securely share and manage these comments and changes. Dropbox just doesn't meet the challenge.