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Use Adobe Acrobat and Stop Printing Real Estate Contracts

Justin McClelland
1 min read

Adobe Acrobat is a software application that allows one to view, create, manipulate and manage files in Adobe’s Portable Document Format (PDF).  PDF’s are most commonly viewed within Adobe’s freeware Adobe Reader, which is available as a no-charge download from Adobe’s website.

By utilizing Adobe Acrobat, you can create custom electronic forms that can be completed electronically as well.

How does this apply to Real Estate?

When submitting offers on properties that are on the MLS, REO’s, FSBO’s, etcetera, processes can become tedious and unorganized before you know it.  You may lose track of an offer that was faxed to a FSBO; you may grow tired of transporting paperwork to Realtors; you may run through printer ink prematurely. You get the picture.

With Adobe Acrobat, you can take any form and make it an electronically fillable form.  For instance, let’s say that you have a standard Residential Sales Contract for your state in paper form.  To convert the paper form into an electronic-fillable PDF, you will need to only:

1. Use a scanner and scan the document to your computer
2. Open the scanned document in Adobe Acrobat
3. Utilize Adobe Acrobat to manipulate and insert fillable-form-fields into the document
4. Save the document as a PDF

With Real Estate forms and contracts saved as PDF’s, you may better organize your business and keep electronic backups of your data.  Another advantage to PDF contracts is that any redundant information within contracts can remain unchanged while you only change information specific to each property offer.

These PDF contracts can then be sent to sellers via email or internet fax.  Or if absolutely necessary, they can be printed on paper.  With Adobe Acrobat, your efficiency of offer submissions can increase dramatically.

Note By BiggerPockets: These are opinions written by the author and do not necessarily represent the opinions of BiggerPockets.