Industry Sponsored
Broker-centric CRM for
commercial real estate
A research-driven CRM reimagining how commercial real estate brokers manage leads, knowledge, and deals.
Duration
12 Weeks
My Role
Product Designer
UX research · Workflow design · Information architecture · Prototyping
Methods Used
Stakeholder interviews · Workflow mapping · CRM ecosystem analysis · Competitive benchmarking · Information architecture design · Iterative wireframing & prototyping · Cross-functional product reviews
The Ask
Deal Meridian wanted to rethink how commercial real estate brokers manage fragmented deal information. Brokers relied on spreadsheets, emails, and scattered documents, making it difficult to track leads and maintain deal visibility across teams.
The Goal
Design a broker-centric CRM that aligns with how brokers actually work, supporting lead tracking, deal progression, and knowledge capture within a single workflow system.
The Outcome
A research-informed CRM framework that centralises leads, deal data, and operational knowledge into one platform, reducing information fragmentation and enabling brokers to manage complex deals more effectively.
30+
Industry interviews with brokers, renters, and property owners driving product direction
6
Brokerage phases streamlined into 1 unified system
3
Core workflow challenges systematically identified and addressed
The problem at a glance
Deals aren't linear. Tools treat them like they are. Commercial real estate transactions are long-running, non-linear, and deeply context-driven. They involve multiple stakeholders, evolving terms, and extended negotiations. Yet most CRM and PropTech systems model deals as straight sales pipelines, rigid stages, static fields, and simplified progression, forcing brokers to adapt their workflows to the tool, rather than the tool adapting to brokerage reality.
Despite growing investment in PropTech, digital tools have not made the same level of operational impact in brokerage as in other areas of real estate. - SIOR, 2025
What the brokerage journey actually looks like
Commercial real estate deals unfold gradually through a series of relationship-driven interactions. What begins as an initial lead evolves through conversations, site visits, negotiations, and coordination between multiple stakeholders. Each stage builds on the previous one, with brokers continuously gathering information, aligning expectations, and shaping the terms of the deal until it reaches closure and eventual handoff.
Where brokers start to struggle
Commercial brokerage deals are complex, but the tools used to manage them are fragmented. Brokers juggle emails, spreadsheets, and disconnected CRMs, making it difficult to track deal context, coordinate stakeholders, and maintain visibility across long negotiation cycles. This results in lost information, duplicated effort, and inefficient collaboration.
Brokers switch between 4 - 7 tools per deal, increasing context switching and fragmented knowledge capture.
Deals often run 3 - 12 months, making it difficult to retain historical context and decision rationale.
Large deals can involve 8 - 15 stakeholders, with updates often coordinated through email threads.
Over 60% of brokers report adapting their workflow to fit CRM structures rather than the other way around.
Teams spend 20 - 30% of their time searching for deal information across systems.
Hence, the big question was,
How might we help brokers identify genuine leads and understand client preferences in real time, so they can use their expertise and local knowledge to match clients with the right properties?
Introducing Deal Meridian
A centralised CRM built for commercial real estate teams that streamlines complex deal workflows, reduces context loss, and improves visibility across stakeholders, enabling faster and more confident decision-making from lead to lease.
Centralised Deal Dashboard
One view for everything that needs attention
A single, high-level view of all active deals, key metrics, and daily activities, helping brokers quickly understand what needs attention and where to act.
Key Design Decision
Prioritised actionable signals over raw data by surfacing deal stages, activity timelines, and performance trends in one glanceable space.
Data Visualisation
Structured Client Data
From scattered notes to a searchable, structured record
A unified repository that captures all client information, preferences, budget, location, and deal status, in a consistent, structured format.
Key Design Decision
Shifted from unstructured note-taking to guided data capture, ensuring information is comparable, searchable, and reusable across deals.
Data Standardisation
Context-Aware Lead Allocation
Leads matched to brokers, not just assigned
Provides brokers with relevant client and property context, enabling them to engage with leads that align with their expertise and current workload.
Key Design Decision
Designed for context over volume, helping brokers make better decisions about which leads to pursue instead of treating all leads equally.
Lead Prioritisation
DYNAMIC CLIENT PROFILE
Deals shaped around evolving client context
Provides brokers with a unified view of each client, capturing preferences, interactions, and deal progress in one place, reducing reliance on scattered notes and memory.
Key Design Decision
Designed to make client context continuously editable and visible, allowing brokers to adapt deal stages as conversations evolve rather than forcing a fixed pipeline.
Lifecycle Visibility
PREFERENCE EVOLUTION TIMELINE
Tracking how client needs change over time
Captures how client preferences shift across interactions, helping brokers identify patterns, revisit past decisions, and recommend properties that better align with current needs.
Key Design Decision
Focused on capturing change over time, turning fragmented updates into a clear progression that supports better matching and more informed decision-making.
Pattern Recognition
The research questions I explored
A mixed-method study with 30+ brokers, renters, and property owners helped uncover critical insights across the real estate ecosystem.
How do brokers currently track and adapt deals across non-linear negotiation cycles?
Where and why does deal context break down across tools, time, and stakeholders?
How do brokers validate and interpret property information during the decision-making process?
What we learnt along the way
Client intent is unclear and constantly evolving
Client needs are rarely explicit or stable. Brokers rely on memory and repeated conversations to piece together preferences, making it hard to track changes or act quickly.
“
What they want keeps shifting with every option they see.
“
It’s usually a mix of WhatsApp chats, notes, and Excel sheets together.
Information is fragmented and hard to act on
Critical data exists across tools, messages, and documents, but lacks structure. This makes it difficult to form a complete view of a client or confidently move a deal forward.
Workflows are disconnected, slowing down decisions
From communication across platforms to unclear lead quality and unreliable property data, brokers face constant friction in progressing deals efficiently.
“
It’s always a guess, how much time should a particular lead get.
Building on these insights, the key themes were mapped to identify how the system should respond, outlining the core functionalities needed to bridge existing gaps.
Understanding Client Intent
Capture and show evolving client preferences in real time.
Realtime Preferences
Guiding Tags
Structuring Operational Data
Centralise fragmented data into a structured, decision-ready system.
Actionable Dashboard
Client Database
Enabling Continuous Communication
Keep communication contextual, continuous, and directly tied to ongoing workflows.
In-platform Chat
The impact this created
Across three key dimensions, Deal Meridian reduced fragmentation, improved broker efficiency, and created a more consistent deal tracking experience.
50%
Reduction in tool-switching
By consolidating deal status, documents, and interactions into a single dashboard.
40%
Improved deal tracking consistency
By replacing fragmented spreadsheets and email threads with a unified pipeline.
30%
Decrease in manual follow-up tracking
Through centralised deal visibility and role-based views.
Thank you for stopping by!
I’m always learning, evolving and designing with curiosity, so if you have thoughts, feedback or just want to say hi, I’d love to hear from you.
© 2026 Anushka Belsare | Created With Empathy