FAQ
Questions, answered straight.
What we get asked most by realtors evaluating Charcom. If something isn’t here, email hello@charcom.ca and we’ll add it.
Getting started
How quickly can I get a Charcom site live?
Same day. Onboarding takes about five minutes, you pick a subdomain, choose one of eight editorial themes, and fill in the basics like your name, brokerage, and service area. The site goes live the moment you finish. If you bring your own domain, that adds about ten minutes once your DNS records propagate.
Do I need any technical skills?
No. If you can fill out a form and pick a colour you like, you can run a Charcom site. Listings, blog posts, testimonials, and your bio are all edited through a regular dashboard, the same way you'd edit a LinkedIn profile. Nothing about the platform requires HTML, CSS, or any coding.
What if I already have a website?
We can usually migrate the content in a single afternoon. Listings, testimonials, and blog posts move over by CSV or by URL. Your old site can stay up while we set yours up, and we'll only redirect traffic once you're happy with the new one. There's no obligation to leave your old host until you're ready.
Can I see what my site will look like before I sign up?
Yes. The eight themes on the homepage are real previews, not mockups. Each one is a fully built site with realistic copy and listings, just rendered with the theme's typography and palette. Pick the one that matches your practice and you'll see the same layout once you sign up.
Pricing
How much does Charcom actually cost?
$29.99 a month, locked for life if you sign up as one of the first 500 founders. There's a one-time setup fee of $99 at checkout, often waived through a partner code from your brokerage. After the founder cohort fills, monthly pricing steps up to $59.99 for new signups, but founders keep the original rate forever.
Are there any hidden fees?
No. The $29.99 monthly and the optional $99 setup are the only charges. We don't bill per listing, per lead, per page, per visitor, or per anything else. If a future add-on ships, like an AI assistant or a paid integration, it'll be a separate opt-in. Your founder rate doesn't change.
Is the $99 setup fee actually waivable?
Yes, most brokerages we partner with give their agents a code that zeroes it out at checkout. If your brokerage hasn't set one up, ask them to email us and we'll get you a code the same day. If you signed up before your brokerage came on board, we'll credit the fee back retroactively.
What happens if I cancel?
Your site stays live through the end of your billing period, then it archives. We hold the data for 90 days in case you change your mind, so you can restore everything with one click. If you brought your own domain, it stays with you. We do not touch your registrar. After 90 days the data is permanently removed.
Features
Will my Charcom site rank on Google?
It's built to. Every site ships with proper schema.org structured data (RealEstateAgent, Residence, FAQPage), per-tenant sitemaps, OpenGraph cards, mobile-first markup, and edge-hosted speed. Local pack ranking still depends on your Google Business Profile and your time on the market, but the technical SEO is solved out of the box.
Can I use my own domain name?
Yes, and we don't charge for it. Buy a domain anywhere (GoDaddy, Namecheap, Cloudflare, wherever you like), add two DNS records we generate for you, and we'll provision the SSL certificate automatically. The whole flow is in your dashboard at /dashboard/domain. Average end-to-end time is about ten minutes plus DNS propagation.
Can I switch themes later without losing my content?
Yes. All eight themes share the same underlying content model, so your listings, blog posts, testimonials, bio, and settings all carry over. The visual treatment changes, the typography and palette swap, but everything you've put in stays where it was. You can switch as often as you like from your dashboard.
Is the weekly blog really written for me or is it templated?
Written for you. Each post is researched on a real local topic (your service area, a recent market move, a question buyers or sellers actually ask), drafted to your byline, and reviewed by a human editor before it goes live. Four posts a month, queued in advance. You can edit or pause any post before it publishes.
Will my site work on phones?
Every theme is mobile-first by design, not retrofitted. Type scales, image crops, navigation, and lead forms all adapt to whatever screen the visitor is using. We test against the actual GTA usage mix (about 70% mobile traffic on realtor sites), so the small screen experience is the priority, not an afterthought.
Can I integrate Google Analytics or Search Console?
Yes. Site settings has fields for your Google Search Console verification token (we drop it into the right meta tag) and your Google Analytics measurement ID (we inject the script with proper consent gating). Calendar embeds support Calendly, Cal.com, and SavvyCal out of the box.
Listings & MLS
How does the IDX feed work?
Through TRREB's authorized vendor program (AMPRE / query.ampre.ca). You generate a feed token in your TRREB syndication portal, paste it into your Charcom dashboard, and we sync your listings nightly. The first sync takes about an hour, then incremental updates happen automatically. Three product tiers are supported: IDX (public listings), VOW (sold data for registered visitors), and AD-A (your own listings).
What boards do you support beyond TRREB?
TRREB is live today. RAHB, OREB, REBGV, and CREB are in the integration queue, expected in the next quarter. If your board uses RESO Web API (the modern standard most CREA boards adopted in 2024), the integration is straightforward and we'll prioritize whichever board has the most demand among our agents.
Can I add listings manually if the MLS feed is not ready?
Yes. The dashboard has a full listing editor with image uploads, address geocoding, price, beds, baths, square footage, and a rich description field. You can also bulk import up to 500 rows from a CSV. Manual listings and MLS feed listings coexist on the same site, the MLS ones just refresh themselves.
Support
Who do I email if I need help?
hello@charcom.ca. Replies typically land within a few hours during weekdays, the same day on weekends. For urgent issues like a custom domain that won't verify or a lead form that isn't sending, we'll get on a screenshare with you the same day. Founder agents also get a direct text channel.
Will you migrate my old site for me?
For founder agents, yes. We'll move your existing content (listings, blog posts, testimonials, bio, About copy, contact info) onto your new Charcom site at no charge, usually within one business day of you giving us access to the old site. We don't touch the old hosting until you confirm the new site is ready.
Do you offer training?
The dashboard is built to be obvious enough that training is rarely needed. That said, every founder agent gets a thirty-minute onboarding call covering the lead inbox, the listings editor, and the blog queue. There's also a short video library at /help with two to four-minute walkthroughs of every screen.
Compliance
Is my site compliant with RECO and REBBA rules?
Yes. Every site includes the RECO-required brokerage display in the footer, an accessible privacy policy, terms of use, and cookie policy. Lead forms include the required consent language for PIPEDA and CASL. If your brokerage has additional branding rules (logo placement, colour usage), the site settings have fields for those too.
Where is my data stored?
Canada. Postgres is hosted on Supabase in their Toronto region. Site hosting runs on Cloudflare's edge with their Canadian PoPs serving GTA visitors. Stripe handles payments under Canadian PIPEDA and PCI compliance. Your data never crosses to a US region for routine operations. Only Cloudflare's automatic failover would, and only briefly.
Who owns the content I put on my site?
You do. Every word you write, every photo you upload, every testimonial you collect remains yours. We license a copy from you only for as long as you're a paying subscriber, and only so we can render and host the site. If you cancel, we hand you a full export (JSON plus media files) and remove our copy.
Still have questions?
Email hello@charcom.ca, we reply same day. Or book a fifteen-minute walkthrough.