Realty SoftwareWhen a real estate team outgrows a basic CRM and starts running serious paid advertising, two platforms tend to dominate the shortlist: BoomTown and CINC (Commissions Inc.). Both bundle an IDX-powered lead-capture website, a CRM with automation, and managed paid-traffic services into a single monthly contract — both cost well over $1,000 a month before ad spend — and both require a long-term agreement before you ever see a dashboard. The decision between them is consequential. But before you evaluate either platform, there is one critical fact you need to know: BoomTown is being retired.
Quick verdict
For teams actively shopping today, CINC is the safer long-term choice. It is an actively developed platform with a Google Premier Partner PPC program, a growing AI layer, and clear ongoing investment. BoomTown, by contrast, is being wound down by its acquirer, Inside Real Estate, in favor of BoldTrail (launched mid-2024). Teams that previously found BoomTown's Success Assurance concierge service compelling should evaluate both CINC's AI features and BoldTrail before committing to a new contract with either platform.
BoomTown overview
BoomTown spent over a decade as one of the most recognized all-in-one platforms in residential real estate. At its peak, it served hundreds of high-producing teams and top-1000 brokerages, earning a reputation for two things: predictive analytics that automatically surfaced leads most likely to transact soon, and Success Assurance — an optional concierge service where BoomTown staff engaged and qualified inbound leads before an agent ever touched them.
The platform includes an IDX website, a CRM with pipeline management and automation, integrated advertising management across Google and Facebook, and team routing. Pricing historically ran from roughly $1,000/month for a single-user Launch plan to $1,500+/month for an Advance plan covering 25 or more agents, with a required paid-advertising minimum of around $250/month and setup fees of $750–$1,700. Annual 12-month contracts are standard.
In January 2023, Inside Real Estate — the company behind kvCORE — acquired BoomTown. By mid-2024, Inside Real Estate had launched BoldTrail as the next-generation replacement, and BoomTown has been in a managed wind-down since. A significant third-party data breach in April 2024 caused an eight-day platform outage, further eroding customer trust. New buyers should ask Inside Real Estate directly about product support timelines before signing any agreement under the BoomTown brand.
CINC overview
CINC (Commissions Inc.) is the other long-standing all-in-one platform at the premium end of the real estate market. Built for high-volume teams running substantial ad budgets, CINC wraps an IDX lead-capture site, a CRM with automation, managed Google and Facebook PPC campaigns, and an AI-powered lead-concierge layer into a single monthly subscription.
CINC's most defensible competitive advantage is its status as a Google Premier Partner — a designation earned by a small fraction of agencies based on ad-spend volume and campaign performance. This relationship enables CINC to manage Google Ads with access to beta features and volume-based efficiencies unavailable to self-managed campaigns or smaller agencies.
Recent AI additions strengthen the platform's speed-to-lead story: Alex AI handles automated text-based lead follow-up, Switchboard Sarah manages call-based first contact, and RealVerified Leads applies two-factor phone verification to filter bot traffic before leads enter the CRM. A Seller Suite module extends lead capture to seller-intent traffic, and three separate mobile apps — for agents, team leaders, and buyers — round out the offering.
Pricing starts at approximately $899–$1,000/month for a solo user and scales to around $1,299/month for up to four users (Ramp plan) and approximately $1,500/month for up to 49 agents (Pro plan). Enterprise teams are quoted custom pricing. Add-ons — CINC AI ($200+/month) and a built-in dialer ($75/month) — push real monthly costs considerably higher before any ad spend is factored in. Contract terms are inconsistently described in marketing materials; some agents have reported early termination fees despite being told month-to-month terms were available. Always review the contract language carefully before signing.
Head-to-head
| Factor | BoomTown | CINC |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price | ~$1,000/mo (Launch, 1 user) | ~$899–$1,000/mo (Solo, 1 user) |
| Team plan | ~$1,300/mo (Grow, up to 25 users) | ~$1,299/mo (Ramp, up to 4 users) |
| Contract | 12-month annual | 6–12 months (verify in writing) |
| Platform status | Being retired; replaced by BoldTrail | Actively developed |
| AI / lead concierge | Success Assurance (human staff) | Alex AI + Switchboard Sarah |
| PPC capability | Google & Facebook managed | Google Premier Partner + Facebook |
| Lead verification | Human qualification (concierge) | RealVerified Leads (2FA phone) |
| Seller tools | Limited | Seller Suite module |
| Mobile apps | 1 | 3 (agent, leader, buyer) |
| Transaction management | Not included | Not included |
| Best fit | Existing customers evaluating migration | High-volume teams and mega-agents |
Pros and cons
BoomTown
- Pro: Success Assurance concierge reduced agent workload by having human staff engage, qualify, and hand off inbound leads — a genuinely differentiated feature during its peak years.
- Pro: Predictive analytics automatically surfaced high-probability leads in the database, reducing the manual work of prioritizing follow-up across a large pipeline.
- Pro: Battle-tested at scale across hundreds of top-producing teams over more than a decade, with a deep playbook for high-volume agent workflows.
- Pro: Comprehensive IDX site and integrated ad-management tooling historically gave teams a strong single-vendor solution for consolidating their lead generation stack.
- Con: The platform is being retired. Inside Real Estate is actively migrating BoomTown customers to BoldTrail. Signing a new annual BoomTown contract today means buying into a sunset product — a significant risk regardless of near-term pricing or feature promises.
- Con: The April 2024 data breach and eight-day outage exposed infrastructure reliability issues and raised questions about vendor accountability that have not been fully resolved publicly.
- Con: Annual contracts with meaningful setup fees make exits costly if the platform reaches end-of-life before your term expires — and that scenario is now more likely than not.
- Con: No built-in transaction management; teams still need a separate compliance and file-management tool such as dotloop or Skyslope, adding cost and integration complexity.
CINC
- Pro: Google Premier Partner status delivers genuine PPC advantages — better campaign data, access to beta features, and volume efficiencies that self-managed or smaller-agency campaigns cannot replicate.
- Pro: RealVerified Leads phone verification filters bot and junk leads before they enter the CRM, improving lead quality without requiring manual scrubbing by agents or team leaders.
- Pro: Alex AI and Switchboard Sarah provide automated text and call-based speed-to-lead, compressing the critical window between lead capture and first live agent contact.
- Pro: Seller Suite extends the platform's lead-capture capabilities to seller-intent traffic, giving high-volume teams a more complete funnel without an additional vendor relationship.
- Con: True all-in cost — platform fee, CINC AI add-on, dialer, and meaningful ad spend — can easily reach $3,500–$5,000+/month, placing it out of reach for most agents and smaller teams regardless of its feature depth.
- Con: Contract terms are inconsistently presented in marketing and third-party reviews, with some agents reporting early termination fees despite verbal promises of flexibility. The written contract is authoritative; treat verbal commitments as unreliable.
- Con: Website designs are heavily template-constrained, leaving limited room for brand differentiation — a real drawback for luxury agents and brokerages whose visual identity is part of their competitive positioning.
- Con: Like BoomTown, CINC does not include transaction management, meaning teams must still budget for and integrate a dedicated compliance tool on top of the platform subscription.
Which should you choose?
Current BoomTown customers: Request a written migration roadmap from your account representative — specifically the timeline, feature parity, and pricing for the move to BoldTrail. Evaluate BoldTrail and CINC side by side before your contract renews. Do not sign a new multi-year BoomTown agreement without contractual protections around platform continuity and data portability.
High-volume teams spending $5,000+/month on paid advertising: CINC is the logical choice in this comparison. The Google Premier Partner PPC, RealVerified lead filtering, and AI-powered speed-to-lead tools are purpose-built for exactly this use case, and the platform has active development momentum. Factor in the full add-on and ad-spend cost before signing, and get contract terms in writing.
Mid-size teams of 2–10 agents built primarily on referrals and sphere of influence: Neither platform is a strong fit at this stage. At $1,000–$1,500/month before ad spend, both require significant paid-traffic volume to generate a positive return. Platforms such as Follow Up Boss or Wise Agent offer more accessible entry points that scale as advertising ambitions grow.
Solo agents: Both vendors will tell you the same thing — these platforms are not designed for solo producers. The minimum investment is disproportionate to the lead volume a single agent can realistically work. Explore purpose-built solo alternatives rather than stretching to justify either platform's price floor.
Large brokerages with 50+ agents: At this scale, CINC's Select tier, BoldTrail, and enterprise platforms such as MoxiWorks and Constellation1 all deserve consideration. Vendor financial health, integration depth with your existing tech stack, and contract flexibility become as important as feature sets.
Compare both platforms feature by feature on our BoomTown vs CINC comparison page.
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