Case studies / Real Estate Development
Case studyBookings, instalments and project cost for a property developer
A developer running several residential and commercial projects moved unit bookings, instalment collections and contractor cost into Odoo, giving leadership one cash-flow view.
Overview
A mid-sized developer in the Gulf with several residential towers, villa communities and mixed-use projects under construction at the same time. Most units are sold off-plan on instalment plans that run through construction and beyond handover.
Scale. Thousands of units on instalment plans, four project companies and dozens of contractors and subcontractors billing against project budgets.
The challenge
Unit bookings, instalment plans and collections lived in spreadsheets kept by the sales administration team. Each project had its own workbook, and each workbook had evolved its own columns and conventions over the years.
Reminders for upcoming instalments were sent by hand, when someone had time. Overdue payments were found by scanning rows, and the finance team regularly asked sales for the latest version of a file before it could chase anyone.
Contractor bills were reconciled to project budgets by hand. Commitments made through contracts and variations were tracked separately from what had been paid, so the true cost to complete a project was always an estimate built at quarter-end.
Sales and finance did not agree on what a booking was. Sales counted a unit as sold when a reservation fee was paid; finance waited for a signed contract and first instalment. Reports from the two teams never matched.
Leaders could not see cash flow by project. With money coming in from buyers and going out to contractors on very different timetables, they needed to know which projects were funding themselves and which needed support.
Construction was also accelerating. Two new launches were planned within a year, and the existing spreadsheets were already at the limit of what the sales administration team could keep accurate.
The solution
Every unit in every project now sits in an Odoo inventory with its status, price and plan. The booking workflow follows the agreed stages, so sales and finance report from the same record and arrive at the same number.
Instalment plans are attached to each sale. Odoo sends reminders before due dates, records payments from the bank feed and payment gateway, and flags overdue amounts for follow-up, without anyone scanning a spreadsheet.
Project budgets hold committed and actual cost side by side. Contracts and variations create commitments, contractor bills are matched against them with retention held back automatically, and the cost to complete is always current.
Finance is consolidated by project and by entity. Management dashboards bring collections, commitments and payments together, so leaders can see which projects generate cash and which need funding in the months ahead.
Design and document management is linked to each project, so contracts, variations and drawings are a click away from the cost lines they affect. Buyers and agents see availability through the enquiry portal, which draws on the same unit inventory.
The engagement
- Eight months
- Six specialists
- Booking definition, Odoo unit inventory, sales, collections, project budgets, contractor billing and multi-entity finance, five integrations, data migration and a project-by-project go-live.
Integrations
- Payment gateway and bank feeds
- Sales and enquiry portal
- Design and document management
- Accounting and tax reporting
- Management dashboards
How we delivered it
- 01
Define a booking
Four weeks
Before any configuration, we brought sales and finance together to agree one definition of a booking and its stages, from reservation to contract to handover. We then mapped how sales, finance and project teams worked around it.
- 02
Configure and report
Twelve weeks
We configured unit inventory, sales, instalment collections, project budgets and contractor billing in Odoo, and built management dashboards that drew directly on those records.
- 03
Migrate and reconcile
Seven weeks
Unit, customer and payment schedule data was migrated for every project and reconciled balance by balance to the general ledger. Differences were resolved with the sales team before go-live.
- 04
Project-by-project go-live
Eleven weeks
Projects went live one at a time, starting with the newest. Weekly review sessions with sales, finance and project managers caught issues early and built confidence in the new numbers.
Results
- Instalment collections tracked automatically per plan
- Live project cost against budget during construction
- One cash-flow view across projects and entities
- Sales and finance reporting from one booking definition
Collections are now tracked automatically against each plan. The collections team works from a daily list of upcoming and overdue instalments, and buyers receive consistent, timely reminders.
Project cost can be seen against budget while building is in progress. Project managers spot overruns as commitments are made rather than when the bills arrive, which gives them time to negotiate or re-plan.
Leadership has one cash-flow view across all projects. Decisions about launch timing, pricing and contractor payments are made from the same set of numbers, and board packs are produced from the system instead of being assembled by hand.
The agreed booking definition ended a long-running argument. Sales and finance now debate what the numbers mean, not which numbers are right.
For the first time, sales and finance walked into the board meeting with the same number of units sold.
What made the difference
Finance and sales agreed one definition of a booking before configuration.
