There’s no way to make this topic sexy. Perhaps you could try reading it to yourself in George Clooney’s voice. (It worked for Nespresso, right?)But you’ve been asking Support about it for yonks - so, here goes. What privilege settings are best for your agency?The answer is one of those really frustrating: “It depends”. Sorry, friends - every agency is different. We’ve built Rex so that you can tweak every user's’ privileges to the nth degree. Trust us - it’s worth it. Your database is your most important asset - being able to control who can view, edit and delete what is kind of big deal.This blog post focuses on our basic settings. For those of you with special requirements, check out the Advanced Privilege Settings blog post.
Operating Models - apply to entire agencies
When our onboarding guru sets you up with Rex, she’ll ask you how your agency operates. The privilege roles in Rex have been designed to fit the three most common real estate agency operating models: open, closed and hybrid.
- In an open office, all agents share information, data and contacts. It’s a transparent, collaborative environment, where everyone can work together if they please. Got a hot buyer, but not the property to match their needs? No problem. If you’re in an open office, you might’ve seen a new listing that ticks their boxes in your activity stream. It’s not your listing, but what the heck? You might just get a split of the commission - or perhaps another agent will do the same for you later.
- Closed offices are the polar opposite. In a closed office, every agent works independently - so it’s critical for agents to know that their contacts, appraisals and interactions with prospects are secure to them (and their team, if they have personal assistants). Although agents in a closed office can see each other’s listings, they can’t view any details unless they’re the listing’s record owner. Closed offices are usually pretty competitive - but they’re great if you’re selling multi-million dollar properties. Cha-ching.
- Hybrid offices are a mix of the two. Agents can all view each other’s listing records, contact records and property records - but they can’t update a record that doesn’t belong to them (without permission). This ensures data integrity, and lets agents maintain some individual ownership over their records. This model is collaborative - but still protects everyone’s interests.
User Roles - classify categories of user
This section actually starts from a fairly simple premise: not every person in your office has the same job - so not every user in Rex has the same role. In many typical offices there are:
- Agents and their PA’s who do the day-to-day work - so they need access to listings, contacts appraisals and so on.
- Admin staff who help many agents out with their day-to-day work - so they need access to all the data their agents have access to. They also help managers and principals out to varying degrees with things like trust accounting, invoicing and payroll - so they need access to these areas, too.
- Managers and principals, who have total oversight. They need access to all data so that they can stay in touch with how the office is going, and all functionality to help get things done.
Rex’s user roles mostly mirror these types of role. Let us show you how.
The mechanics
When you set up a new user in Rex, they won’t be assigned to any user role. This means that they literally cannot do anything in Rex. Nothing. Nada. Niente.The way you assign roles to your users depends on how your agency chooses to operate. Our default roles have been designed to work for most offices - but offices that have special differences can easily tweak the system to work better for them. If that’s you, keep your eyes peeled for our advanced privileges blog in a few weeks.There are both Admin and Agent privilege roles:
Admin roles
Admin staff need the greatest access in order to do their jobs properly - but not all admin roles are created equal. There are two options in Rex for Admin users:
- Super Admin. This user can do almost everything the account owner can do, with a few exceptions relating to opening and closing trust accounts.
- General Admin. This user has access to all records, mass actions and can do any actions that don't affect the application overall.
Generally, the agency owner and one head administrator are assigned as Super Admin. They’ve got all of the access.General Admin is a lower level administrative role - suitable for all other administrators, executive assistants, secretaries… you get the gist. If you want to restrict someone’s access to sensitive areas in Rex, you’d assign them a General Admin. General Admin can do things like send newsletters but they don’t have access to agent ledgers, for example.But remember, if you operate on a closed office model, both Super Admin and General Admin user roles can view all agents’ private data in Rex. For agents with personal assistants - you’ll need to add them to a permission group, so they can only see the listing, property and contact records belonging to the agent they work for. We’ll cover this in our next blog post.
Agent roles
There are three privilege roles for agents:
- Agent: Open Office. This user can see and edit all records in Rex.
- Agent: Hybrid Office. This user can see (but not update) core data records that belong to other users in Rex (they can still see and edit their own records).
- Agent: Closed Office. This user can only see and update their own records in Rex.
As we said, in an open office, all agents can view and update every record. And you know what a bigger database means? More opportunities to buy, sell and rent property.Picture this: you go to an appraisal, run a reverse buyer match - and hey presto! You’ve got a list of 40 interested buyers who are looking for a property just like it. In a closed office, you’d only be able to see those contacts you entered into the system yourself.But, we’ve said it before - with great power comes great responsibility. Agents with open office user roles have unrestricted access to every property, listing and contact record in Rex.Agents in a hybrid office user role can view other agents’ records, but can’t update them (without permission). This ensures record integrity. So, although one agent can contact another agent’s seller and leave a note on the listings record, they can’t change any of the listing details - such as the advertised price or open home time (without being given express permission on that listing).Agents in a closed office user role are even more restricted. As mentioned above, they can still see (but not edit) each other’s listing records. However, these agents aren’t able to see each other’s contact records, meaning the likelihood of duplicate records is high. They also can’t carry out any administrative tasks - General Admin or Super Admin users will have to do it for them. Agents could also set up their own effective business unit in Rex, using permission groups - but that’s a topic for the Advanced Privilege Settings blog post.So, there you have it. The right privilege sets for your agency depends on the environment you want to foster in your agency.If you've got that down pat, head on over to our Advanced Privilege Settings blog post. And remember, if you ever need help - just head on over to our help centre.
