Questions builders actually ask

Afterkey is a post-closing software platform for residential home builders that turns the homes they have already closed into a service business: homeowner maintenance memberships the builder prices, paid repair work billed through the builder’s own branded portal, and warranty callbacks routed to the builder’s subs. It consists of three portals: a builder portal for homes, requests, subcontractors, memberships, repair billing, and payouts; a homeowner portal, under the builder’s brand, for joining the membership, submitting requests, approving repair prices, and viewing the maintenance schedule and service history; and a subcontractor portal for assigned jobs, status and photo updates, and compliance documents.

Afterkey is built for production and custom residential home builders, roughly 5 to 50 homes a year, who have closed homes they are not earning on. It is designed for builders who want every closed home to produce recurring membership revenue, billed repair work, and the next job, instead of unpaid callbacks and 9pm texts. Subcontractors and homeowners use Afterkey through their own portals at no cost to them; the builder is the paying customer.

Afterkey has one plan with no tiers: $149 per month base, which includes unlimited team members and subcontractors, plus $10 per month per active home. Prospect homes (past builds you are pitching a membership) and archived homes (read-only history) are free; a home bills while you are actively serving it. Optional AI and SMS add-ons are priced on the pricing page. There is no platform fee on homeowner payments; the only cost on membership dues and repair payments is payment processing, at Afterkey’s published flat rates, also on the pricing page. Afterkey never sets or caps what the builder charges homeowners for a membership or a repair. Onboarding is free. Afterkey does not offer a free trial; every new account is instead covered by a 30-day money-back guarantee.

No. Warranty repairs are the builder’s obligation and stay free for every homeowner, member or not, and a homeowner who does not join never waits longer for warranty work. The membership sells maintenance — what every house needs from day one, regardless of who built it — and it is never a paywall in front of warranty service.

A brand-new house needs its HVAC serviced twice a year, the boiler or furnace serviced annually, the dryer vent cleaned, the water heater flushed, and its appliances maintained on the manufacturer’s schedule — from day one, regardless of who built it. Warranty covers what the builder got wrong; maintenance covers what every house needs. A maintenance membership sells the second one, starting at closing.

Whatever your market carries — Afterkey never sets your price. Builders typically think in tiers: $20 to $40 a month for the maintenance schedule and the reminders; $100 to $250 for scheduled service, where your subs come on the schedule for HVAC, the boiler, the dryer vent, the water heater, and the appliances; and $500 a month or more for a full-service plan that covers everything that goes into a house — lawn and grounds, gutters, plumbing, septic, snow. You define the plan and its tiers, the homeowner puts a card or bank account on file in your branded portal, and the plan bills monthly to your own account. There is no platform fee on homeowner payments; you pay only processing, at Afterkey’s published flat rates.

Whatever you put in the plan — you define each tier and the portal shows the homeowner the list before they join. In the example bottom tier, $40 a month buys the calendar: a maintenance schedule built from that house’s own manuals, a reminder by email or text when something is due, your branded portal to submit a request and talk to the sub, and the home’s documents and service history in one place. The service visits are not included at that tier; the homeowner books one from the reminder, the sub quotes it, and they approve the price before anyone comes out. Move up a tier and the visits and labor are in: two HVAC tune-ups a year, the annual boiler service, the dryer vent, the water heater flush, appliances on the manufacturer’s interval. At the top, the whole house — lawn, gutters, septic, snow — for one number a month.

Yes. A maintenance plan is whatever you decide to sell. At the top of the ladder it is a full-service plan: your subs handle lawn care, HVAC maintenance, appliance maintenance, plumbing, septic, gutters, snow — everything that goes into a house — on a schedule, and the homeowner pays one number a month to you. Afterkey holds the schedule, routes each visit to the right sub, sends the reminders, bills the plan to your account, and keeps the record. The trades who built the house keep it running, and the homeowner has one company to call for the life of the home. Whatever the tier, the plan covers maintenance; warranty work stays free.

The sub quotes the job and your markup is added on top. The homeowner approves the estimate in their portal, which also puts a card or bank account on file; nothing is charged yet. When the work is done — the sub confirms on site that the quote still covers it, and completion photos are required — the homeowner approves the finished job, or the review window passes (24 hours by default), and the saved payment method is charged. The money settles to your account at Afterkey’s published processing rates with no platform fee; you pay your sub the way you do today, and Afterkey keeps the sub’s invoice on the record. The charge can never exceed the amount the homeowner approved.

Every request is classified warranty or billable automatically when it comes in, from the home’s warranty dates (plus any per-trade extension you set) and whether the home is on a plan; a home with no warranty date on file defaults to warranty, never to a bill. The sub cannot change it: if the “leak” turns out to be a hose bib left open, he flags it, you decide, and the homeowner is told. You can also convert a request yourself at any time. Nothing billable is ever charged until the homeowner has approved the price. Warranty work stays warranty, billable work gets billed, and nobody argues about which is which after the fact.

Afterkey’s AI does four things: it extracts appliances (brand, model, serial, warranty) from uploaded invoices, spec sheets, and photos; it extracts the maintenance tasks a manual prescribes; it researches a known make and model for the manufacturer’s published maintenance and links the source; and it reads a sub’s paper invoice. Every suggested schedule line carries its source — the manufacturer when one was found, the uploaded document, or an honest “typical schedule — verify against the manual” label when the AI is working from general knowledge. The builder reviews the proposed list, removes or edits lines, and saves it; nothing reaches a homeowner before that. Before a research pass spends anything, Afterkey shows which appliances are already in the shared library (free) and which are new, with a dollar estimate. It does not answer homeowner questions, close requests, or decide anything about a repair.

Builder, homeowner, and subcontractor data is separated by role, so each party sees only what applies to them: homeowners see their own home, and subcontractors see only the jobs assigned to them. Afterkey does not sell or trade customer data. Homeowner payments are processed by a PCI-compliant payment processor, and Afterkey does not store card numbers. Documents uploaded to a home’s binder belong to the builder and the homeowner, and are used to build that home’s maintenance record.

A CRM is organized around leads, deals, and a pipeline that ends when a sale closes. Afterkey is organized around homes, service requests, and subcontractors, and begins at the moment a CRM would finish. Afterkey understands warranty periods, appliances, and maintenance intervals; it dispatches subcontractors by trade and tracks their insurance and license expirations; and it gives the homeowner a portal of their own. Afterkey is also priced per home with unlimited users, rather than per seat.

Yes. Afterkey is white-labeled, and the branding is the builder’s throughout. Builders upload their own logo and set their brand colors in settings, and those carry across the homeowner portal. The builder’s business name appears on the portal, on every email notification, on payment receipts, and on the handoff binder given to the homeowner. Builders on the SMS add-on get a dedicated business number that homeowners text directly. A few specifics worth stating plainly: homeowners reach the portal through branded links rather than a custom domain of the builder’s own; every email carries the builder’s business name in the From line — “Your Company (via Afterkey)” — but is sent from Afterkey’s address; payment receipts and the handoff binder carry a small “Powered by Afterkey” line; and the sign-in screen, the terms, and the privacy policy are Afterkey’s. The brand that leads the homeowner experience is the builder’s.

Homeowners get access to a browser-based portal, white-labeled under the builder's business — there is no app to download. They submit warranty and service requests with photos, talk directly with the sub assigned to the job, approve the price of any billable repair before they are charged, view the maintenance schedule built for their specific home and appliances, and see the full service history of the house. If the builder offers a maintenance plan, the homeowner picks a tier in the portal, the builder enrolls the home, and the homeowner puts a card or bank account on file there. Warranty work is never behind the plan.

No. Subcontractors use Afterkey free. They open each job from a link — no app, no login — update status from the jobsite, upload the completion photos every job requires, and keep compliance documents such as general liability, workers’ compensation, auto insurance, trade licenses, and W-9s current. The builder’s $149 monthly base includes unlimited subcontractors, so adding trades never increases the bill.

No. Afterkey is not a marketplace, a network, or a contractor directory, and it does not send you leads for new trades. It works only with the subcontractors you have already vetted and added to your own roster — the trades who built the house are the ones who keep it running.

An active home is a home you are actively serving on Afterkey. It bills at $10 per month, flat, regardless of the home’s age. Two home states are free. A prospect home is a past build you are trying to win back: adding it costs nothing, and you can pitch memberships and send claim invites, but full service features stay off until it converts — which happens automatically when the homeowner starts a membership or a warranty date is set, or when you activate it yourself. An archived home is the honest exit: free and read-only, with the full history and binder preserved, and you can reactivate it any time, which resumes billing.

Yes. Add a past build as a prospect home — it costs nothing while you court it. You build a maintenance-plan proposal with one or more tiers at prices you set, and Afterkey emails it to the homeowner with a claim link: it opens their own portal with the home already set up, they set a password, and your offer is in front of them. If they join, the home converts to active automatically and normal billing starts. You can also put an expiration on any offer so an old quote does not linger at old pricing.

Onboarding is free: you subscribe, add your homes and subcontractors, and start logging requests the same day. There is no free trial — every new account is covered by a 30-day money-back guarantee instead, so you evaluate Afterkey on your real homes rather than in a sandbox. Existing homes come in one at a time: add the home, upload its documents, and Afterkey extracts the appliances and proposes the maintenance schedule for you to review and save.

Yes. Afterkey is month-to-month with no contracts and no termination fees. New accounts are also covered by a 30-day money-back guarantee: if it is not working for you, we refund every dollar Afterkey charged. The only exceptions are the $29 SMS add-on for the phone number you used and any SMS usage over your included allotment. Your rate is locked for 24 months from signup; after that, any increase requires 60 days’ notice, takes effect at your next billing cycle, and is never applied mid-term or retroactively.