How to sell to CTOs at Real estate companies
CTOs in real estate are primarily measured on system uptime and the speed of technology deployment. They respond to outreach that demonstrates a clear understanding of the challenges in integrating new technologies with existing property management systems. Highlighting how your solution can minimize downtime during upgrades or migrations will resonate with their priorities.
Written and maintained by the SoloRiff team, who build outbound software and run outbound with it. The figures below are our own: we measured 562 real estate company domains over public DNS on 2026-09-03. Last updated 2026-09-03.
What actually hurts
- system downtime during upgrades
- integration issues with legacy systems
- data silos across platforms
- slow deployment of new technologies
The playbook
- 01
Identify recent tech investments
Look for real estate firms that have recently announced significant technology investments or upgrades. Use news aggregators or industry reports to filter for companies that are expanding their tech stack, as these are likely to be more open to discussions about new solutions.
- 02
Pinpoint operational inefficiencies
Research common pain points in property management systems, such as integration issues or data silos. Use forums and industry publications to identify specific complaints from CTOs, which can help tailor your message to address these inefficiencies directly.
- 03
Craft a message around system reliability
When reaching out, focus on how your solution can enhance system reliability and support seamless tech integration. Mention specific scenarios where downtime has impacted operations, as this will resonate with their need for continuous service availability.
- 04
Leverage industry connections for introductions
Utilize LinkedIn to find mutual connections within the real estate technology space. Request introductions from these connections, as a warm introduction often yields better responses than cold outreach, especially in a conservative industry like real estate.
- 05
Suggest a discussion on tech scalability
In your follow-up, propose a brief call specifically to discuss how your solution can scale with their growing tech needs. Emphasize the importance of future-proofing their systems to handle increased data and user demands, which is a critical concern for CTOs.
Can real estate companies even receive your mail?
We measured the DNS of 562 real estate companies, sampled evenly across company sizes, to see how many authenticate their own email. It matters in both directions: a domain that does not authenticate is a domain whose team is used to mail going missing — and if your own domain is in the gap, yours is the mail going missing.
Publishes a DMARC policy of quarantine or reject — the domain actually asks receivers to act on failures.
The gap is the finding: 25.2% of 1–10-person companies against 83.6% of the largest — 58 points apart. Small companies are where the unauthenticated domains are, and small companies are who most cold outreach is aimed at.
Where does your domain sit?
Same three lookups, run live against your domain. Nothing is stored and nothing is emailed to you.
How this was measured
Company domains were sampled within employee-count bands, then queried over public DNS for SPF (TXT at the apex), DMARC (TXT at _dmarc.) and MX. One domain per company, deduplicated. Anyone can reproduce any single row of this with dig.
DKIM is deliberately absent. A DKIM key lives under a selector that cannot be enumerated from outside the domain, so a company with flawless DKIM under a name we did not guess would be counted as having none. That would measure our guess list, not the industry.
Domains with no MX record are excluded rather than counted as failures — parked and redirect-only domains would otherwise drag every figure down and make the result an artefact of the sample.
Sampled within bands, so this describes the population of companies, not of employees: a 10-person company counts once, as does a 10,000-person one. Each band is at least 60 domains; bands below that are not published. Figures are percentages of the sample, not of the whole industry, and we publish no company names — only counts.
Measured 2026-09-03. Re-measured monthly.
The full census across every industry — sortable, with sample sizes, free to reuse under CC BY 4.0.
Subject lines that fit
- Improving system uptime
- Streamlining tech integration
- Future-proofing your systems
Questions
- Why do CTOs in real estate overlook cold outreach?
- CTOs often receive numerous cold emails that fail to address specific industry challenges. Many outreach attempts lack personalization and do not demonstrate an understanding of the unique issues faced in real estate technology, leading to a general disinterest.
- What common objections do CTOs have during tech discussions?
- CTOs frequently express concerns about integration complexity and potential disruptions to current operations. They may also question the ROI of new technology investments, preferring solutions that clearly outline benefits and have proven success in similar contexts.
- How can I make my outreach stand out to real estate CTOs?
- Focus on specific pain points that real estate CTOs face, such as system reliability and integration challenges. Providing case studies or examples of how your solution has successfully addressed similar issues in the industry can help capture their attention.
- What role does compliance play in tech decisions for real estate CTOs?
- Compliance is critical for CTOs in real estate, as they must ensure that technology solutions adhere to regulations governing data security and privacy. Any outreach should emphasize how your solution supports compliance efforts while enhancing operational efficiency.
Or have it run itself
SoloRiff does every step above on its own — finds the companies, finds the people, writes each of them individually, and handles the replies. Drop your URL and watch it work before you sign up for anything.
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