Keybox, a rapid digital payment technology now available for the real estate industry, has integrated with SkySlope, a product used to digitally manage home transactions, it was announced.

Payload Keybox said the partnership will allow users of SkySlope to tap into secure payment technology to pay earnest money deposits immediately upon a contract’s signing for deposit “within “seconds,” as well as make payments in unison with other deal milestones that may require payment.

Partnering with established entities is a common method for newer organizations to gain adoption. While Payload Keybox has been proven in other industries since its founding in 2019, it only recently entered residential real estate. The partnership also makes sense because of the natural overlap of executing agreements and making payments. The threat of wire fraud continues to haunt real estate, as well, making secure money exchanges critical.

Relative to how the two technologies will work together, Buck Avey, vice president of Product at SkySlope, said, “The integration is activated by brokerage administrators, revealing a ‘request deposit’ button that agents can click to select the escrow holder and request earnest money from their homebuyer.”

The homebuyer will then react to a request for payment, submit their amount and source, and await confirmation from the receiving party, which is often a designated escrow holder.

The statement claimed that currently SkySlope serves 307,000 agents while partnering with more than half of the top 20 brokerages in the nation. In total, the product has been a part of approximately 3 million transactions.

A recent Inman review granted 4 stars to Payload Keybox, noting that it employs the highest known level of banking transaction security and can be white-labeled for individual brokerages as needed for sharing payment platforms with consumers and other agents.

“When we explored electronic EMD options, we quickly landed on Payload Keybox,” Avey said. “Their integration platform is robust and allows SkySlope to create the type of seamless experience brokerages, agents, and homebuyers expect.”

The company has also linked its services to Dotloop and DocuSign Rooms, also highly popular electronic forms and transaction management solutions. Users can also track Payload Keybox payments with back-office accounting tools BrokerMint and Reealizy by MoxiWorks.

“Rather than introducing an entirely new platform to learn and adopt, Keybox is designed to simply integrate into existing platforms,” Zach Jacob, vice president of Partnerships at Payload, said in a statement. “All payment activity is recorded within the SkySlope log and electronic receipts are distributed and posted automatically.”

In a demonstration of their product to Inman, Payload Keybox said the industry can expect more partnership announcements this year.

The companies have put together a landing page that details their relationship.

Email Craig Rowe