Every home you’ve built is a customer

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.

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.