Real Estate Answering Service: Options and Costs (2026)
A buyer calls the number on your yard sign while you’re mid-showing. If voicemail picks up, they call the next sign on the street. In real estate the answered call usually wins, and the booked showing wins more often.
The quick answer: A real estate answering service picks up when you can’t: during showings, closings, nights and weekends. Live services like Specialty Answering Service, PATLive and Ruby run about $270 to $720 a month at 60 calls. AI options start lower. Carly is the pick for agents and teams: it answers your business number when you don’t, asks every caller the same questions, books the showing on your real calendar, calls new portal leads back within a minute and logs everything to Follow Up Boss or your CRM.
Real estate answering service costs at 60 calls a month
US list prices from each vendor’s own pricing page, checked October 23, 2026. The last column estimates a month for an agent or small team sending 60 calls to the service, about 3 minutes each (180 minutes).
| Option | Who answers | Entry price | Billing unit | At 60 calls (180 min) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Carly | AI on your number, after you | Free Zapier-style workflows; AI agents from $35/mo | Monthly plan | Setup: one prompt in ChatGPT or Claude |
| Smith.ai AI Receptionist | AI, with live staff available | Free for 25 calls, then $3 a call | Per call | $150 (Pro, 75 calls) |
| Quo Sona | AI inside Quo’s phone app | 10 calls free, then $25 for 40 | Per call | From $25, plus Quo seats from $15 |
| Specialty Answering Service | Humans | $44 plus $1.54/min | Per minute, by the second | $269 (220-minute plan) |
| PATLive | Humans | $49 plus $2.99/min | Per minute | $349 (200-minute plan) |
| Smith.ai live receptionists | Humans | $300 for 30 calls | Per call | $645 ($300 + 30 calls at $11.50) |
| Ruby | Humans | $250 for 50 minutes | Per minute | $720 (200-minute plan) |
Human answering lands between $269 and $720 at this volume. The difference that matters isn’t price. It’s whether the caller hangs up with a showing on your calendar or a promise that you’ll call back.
What each option does with a sign call at 6:30pm
| Buyer calling on a listing | Seller asking what their home is worth | Portal lead that filled in a form | What you see at 8am | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Voicemail | Calls the next sign | Calls the next agent | Waits until you dial | A list of voicemails |
| Live answering service | Message taken, sometimes a showing request | Message taken | Not covered | Messages by email or app |
| AI message-taker | Name, number and property captured | Same | Not covered | Transcripts and a callback list |
| Carly | Questions answered from the listing, showing booked, confirmation texted | Listing appointment booked with the listing agent | Called within about a minute | Every call, text and booking in one inbox and your CRM |
Four jobs a real estate answering setup has to do
1. Answer from the listing, not from a script
Callers ask about price, beds, HOA fees, pets, parking and whether it’s still available. A good setup answers from the details you give it and routes anything it can’t.
2. Book the showing before they hang up
A callback is a second chance to lose them. Look for booking on your real calendar (or round robin across your team), with a confirmation text from your number.
3. Call portal leads back in minutes, not hours
In a study of 1.25 million sales leads written up in Harvard Business Review, firms that tried to reach a lead within an hour were nearly seven times as likely to qualify it as firms that waited longer. Zillow and Realtor.com leads shop several agents at once. More in our speed-to-lead statistics.
4. Ask every caller the same questions
Consistent questions on every call make your fair housing practice easier to stand behind than an improvised conversation.
How Carly covers an agent’s phone
Carly is reliable and endlessly customizable: it follows your rules on every call, the same way, so your buyer leads get the same treatment at 2pm and 10pm.
- You ring first. During your hours your phone (or your team’s) rings. Carly answers when nobody picks up, and right away after hours or during showings.
- Answers from your listings. Give Carly the details for each property and it answers price, size, HOA and pet questions, and says when something’s under contract.
- Books showings and listing appointments on the right agent’s real Google or Outlook calendar, round robin across your team, then texts the confirmation.
- Calls new leads in about a minute. Web form fills and portal leads get a call, then a text and an email if they miss it (how it works).
- Texts back every missed call and keeps the thread on your business number (missed-call text back).
- Knows past clients. Contacts in your CRM are greeted by name, with their history in front of Carly.
- Logs to your CRM. Follow Up Boss, HubSpot, Salesforce or Carly’s own CRM, with a summary and transcript of every call. Carly connects to thousands of apps.
- English or Spanish, detected from the caller.
- Run it from your AI chat. Ask ChatGPT or Claude to text every buyer who saw 42 Maple this weekend, or call back yesterday’s open house sign-ins (see how).
Free Zapier-style workflows; AI agents from $35/month. Keep your current number and forward the calls you miss, or grab a new one in the chat. Paste this into ChatGPT or Claude to start:
Carly business setup prompt
Paste this into ChatGPT, Claude or any AI. It walks you through the rest.
Help me connect Carly Teams so I can work with my organization's business texts, phone calls, voicemail and voice/text agents from this chat. I'll add it to you myself: tell me exactly what to click for the app you are, one step at a time, and wait for me to confirm before moving on. If a step doesn't match what I see, ask me what's on my screen. If you can do the setup yourself (Claude Code, Codex, Muse, Grok Bot), go ahead, and ask me for any key in your secure credential prompt, never in the chat. Don't tell me it's connected until list_phone_lines works, and if I have several teams, ask which to use. Before sending a text or making a call, confirm the team, recipient and message or task with me. The steps are below.
# Connect Carly Teams to an AI app
> Carly Teams works a team's business phone lines through the team's AI agents: business texts, phone calls, voicemail, the voice and text agents, and the team's CRM.
MCP server: https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp (streamable HTTP, OAuth)
## Setup
Carly Teams isn't in any plugin or connector directory yet, so it's added as a custom connection by URL.
1. Add Carly Teams:
- ChatGPT: open https://chatgpt.com/plugins, click Add, and choose Create MCP App (not Create plugin or Upload plugin archive). If Create MCP App isn't on the menu, turn on Developer mode first in Settings > Security and login. Name it "Carly Teams" with the description "Work with my team's business texts, calls, voicemail and voice/text agents," paste https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp as the server URL, choose OAuth, create it, and sign in. Then in the message box open the + menu, choose Developer mode, and pick Carly Teams. No plugin needs to be built, packaged or uploaded.
- Claude (claude.ai, Claude Desktop, or Cowork): Customize > Connectors > Add custom connector, name it Carly Teams, paste https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp, and sign in.
- Claude Code: `claude mcp add --transport http --scope user carly-teams https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp`, then /mcp, pick carly-teams, and authenticate.
- Codex: `codex mcp add carly-teams --url https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp`, then `codex mcp login carly-teams`.
- Cursor: add {"mcpServers": {"carly-teams": {"url": "https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp"}}} to ~/.cursor/mcp.json, then sign in to carly-teams from Customize.
- Muse: a custom connector to https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp with a Carly API key as its bearer token. The key comes from carlyassistant.com/integrations (Advanced > API Keys > Create a new key, with Owner set to the team and all scopes selected) and goes in Muse's connector settings, not in a chat message.
- Grok: grok.com/connectors > New Connector > Custom, paste https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp, and sign in.
- Grok Bot: a custom remote MCP server named carly-teams at https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp. Approve it and sign in.
- Perplexity: Plugins in the sidebar (or Customize > Connectors), then Add custom > Connector > Add MCP connector. Choose Remote, name it Carly Teams, paste https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp, pick OAuth, check the box and click Add, then click the Carly Teams card to sign in.
- Anything else: a remote MCP server (streamable HTTP) named carly-teams at https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp. It signs in with OAuth.
Sign in with the Carly account that belongs to the organization.
2. Once it's added, the Carly Teams tools show up in the chat, including list_phone_lines. If they don't, turn Carly Teams on for the chat or start a new chat.
3. To check it worked, call list_phone_lines: it returns the teams and phone lines the account can reach. A team with no phone line yet can get one with find_numbers (optionally by area code) and get_number, which may return a checkout link to finish.
4. Something to try first: "Review our missed calls and voicemail and help me reply to customers." Carly Teams also reads and answers business texts, has the team's agent make calls, and edits the voice and text agents. Texts and calls go out at once from the agent's number and can't be taken back. Team permissions apply.
## Email, calendars and workflows
Email, calendars, files, booking pages and workflows are the regular Carly connector, added separately. It's listed in ChatGPT's plugin directory (https://chatgpt.com/plugins/plugin_asdk_app_6a67a26316b88191860222f918d4ec54) and Claude's connector directory (https://claude.ai/directory/carly), and connects anywhere else at https://carlyassistant.com/mcp/. Its setup is https://carlyassistant.com/mcp.txt.Then call your own sign number from another phone and ask about the listing (here’s how to test it). Get started.
Questions to ask any real estate answering service
- Can it book showings on my calendar, or only take a message? A message is a callback you still have to win.
- Does it call portal leads, or only answer inbound? Most answering services only pick up.
- What’s billed? Minutes, calls or a plan, plus overage rates and how calls are rounded (Specialty Answering Service bills by the second).
- Does it log to my CRM? Follow Up Boss or wherever your pipeline lives.
- Can it answer in Spanish? Ruby, Smith.ai and Carly all offer bilingual answering.
For the wider stack, see AI ISAs for real estate, AI tools for real estate agents and the property management answering service guide.
FAQ
How much does a real estate answering service cost?
At about 60 calls a month, live services run from $269 (Specialty Answering Service) to $720 (Ruby) on list prices checked October 23, 2026. Smith.ai’s AI Receptionist is $150 for 75 calls. Carly: Free Zapier-style workflows; AI agents from $35/month.
Can an answering service book real estate showings?
Some live services book through a scheduling tool if you pay for it. Carly books the showing on the agent’s real calendar during the call and texts the confirmation.
What’s the difference between an answering service and an ISA?
An answering service picks up calls. An inside sales agent (ISA) also chases leads who haven’t called. Carly does both: it answers inbound calls and calls new leads back within a minute. See best AI ISA for real estate.
Can I keep my number?
Yes. Forward the calls you miss to Carly, or get a new number in the chat. Live services also work with forwarded numbers.
Ready to automate your busywork?
Carly schedules, researches, and briefs you—so you can focus on what matters.
See what people say
"Before Carly, I relied on a Calendly link, but the whole process felt impersonal and not very professional. Carly changed that by handling all the back-and-forth, so I'm no longer stuck in endless email threads trying to line up schedules.
Now Carly reaches out to candidates, shares my real-time availability, lets them pick a slot, then sends a Zoom link and drops it straight into my calendar. She sends reminders to both of us before each call, which has significantly reduced no-shows and last-minute confusion.
On top of scheduling, Carly acts like a full executive assistant, sending me my schedule the night before so I can prepare for each call. It reminds me of the old x.ai assistant, but Carly is noticeably smarter, faster, and better suited to my healthcare recruitment business."
