Most SoftPro users know the basics of their software. After all, we pride ourselves on offering flexible, customizable solutions that let you choose exactly what you need and add more features and functionality as you go.
Chances are, though, there are a few everyday tasks you’re still doing the hard way. That’s understandable. Once you’ve developed your day-to-day routine and workflows, it can be easy to forget some of the tips you learned during training, or even miss features you didn’t realize were available.
So, whether you’re brand-new to SoftPro, have been with us for years, or are simply exploring what our award-winning closing, title, and escrow solutions can do, we’ve put together 16 tips to help you get even more value out of the tools you use every day.
Want to see some of these tips in action?
Watch Saved You a Seat Episode 70 for SoftPro Standard and Enterprise users or Saved You a Seat Episode 72 for SoftPro Select users.
For helpful screenshots that accompany these tips, download the PDF version of this guide.
Use the links below to jump to a specific section of this blog:
16 Time-Saving Tips Every SoftPro User Should KnowOur first eight tips can help you no matter which edition of SoftPro you use. Some steps or layouts may vary by edition, but the underlying ideas will apply across SoftPro Standard/Enterprise, Select, and Hosted.
A few simple keyboard shortcuts can save you from constantly reaching for your mouse or clicking through screens. Here are some you’ll want to put to memory:
F1: Opens SoftPro Help, which contains articles, job aids, and video resources (and when used from a specific field, can take you directly to Help information for that field).
F2: Clears field contents and re-establishes field links if a user has overridden a linked field.
F6: Allows you to search for a field name and jump directly to it.
F7: Runs spell check within a text field.
F8: In SoftPro Standard and Enterprise, opens a calculator for performing calculations within numeric fields. In SoftPro Select, opens the Formula Editor, where users with the appropriate permissions can enter free-form formulas or use predefined formulas.
F9: Opens lookup tables associated with a field.
Those saved clicks may seem small, but trust us, they add up. And the more you use them, the more intuitive it becomes as you move through orders.
If you find yourself entering the same Requirements and Exceptions over and over, that’s another opportunity to save yourself time. Set up commonly used language so you’re not manually recreating it for every file. Use prompts for information that needs to be entered for each file, and field codes to pull in information already entered elsewhere in the order. To find the right field code, open the Field Code Browser from the order ribbon in Select or located at the bottom of your screen in Standard/Enterprise and select the field you want to pull from.
Order notes can help you document activity and “tell the story” of an order. For SoftPro Standard and Enterprise users, press Ctrl+A to automatically insert the date, time, and username before adding your note. This makes it easier to document conversations and actions as they happen and gives others a quick way to see what’s already occurred without having to track down the details later.
SoftPro Select and Hosted users: The date and time are automatically added to order notes.
You may already know about lookup tables, but are you using them everywhere they can save you time? You can store frequently used contacts and their associated details, such as mailing addresses and phone numbers, so you can quickly retrieve their information and insert it into your order. Stored contacts can include:
Lenders
Real estate agents
Underwriters
HOAs
This also helps keep frequently used contacts consistent across orders.
Did you know that in the Attachments Folder, you can store PDFs, scans, emails, Excel spreadsheets, voicemails, and other important order-related information right inside the order? This keeps everything together in one central, organized place. Instead of searching through different folders or locations for what you need, your important documents are right where you need them, making them easier to find and access as you work.
Instead of fishing through folders to find the same documents you frequently use, you can create a custom User ReadyDocs folder to keep them at your fingertips. Add frequently used documents like commitments, policies, and settlement statements and organize them in a way that works best for you. When you’re ready to generate them, they’ll automatically populate with data from your order.
Spot an error in a generated document? Instead of fixing the mistake only in the document, make the change in the appropriate source field. The corrected information can then carry through to other documents that pull from that field. That will keep you from having to make the same correction manually again.
When information from a previous transaction applies to a new order, don’t build a new order from scratch. Use the Overlay File/Template to import existing information into the new order, including order contacts and property information, legal descriptions, and title exceptions. Then simply update what’s changed and remove what no longer applies.
Our remaining tips are specific to the SoftPro Select edition of our software. If you’re a SoftPro Standard or Enterprise user, keep reading! These tips offer a closer look at how SoftPro Select is fully customizable and configurable to meet your organization’s specific needs.
Interested in learning whether SoftPro Select is right for your organization? Contact our sales team to learn more.
If you don’t need a document for a particular transaction, why waste time sorting through it? Document visibility conditions let you control what appears based on information in the order, such as the state, underwriter, or other criteria. Conditions can be applied to an individual ReadyDoc, a folder, or the entire ReadyDoc tree. By limiting what you see to documents relevant to the transaction, you find what you need much faster.
If you haven’t explored Work Lists yet, you may be overlooking one of SoftPro Select’s most useful tools for organizing your day. Work Lists let you create custom queries to organize your orders and create queues for the files and tasks you need to address. For example, you can build a Work List for:
Overdue tasks
Tasks due today
Upcoming closings
Pending receipts
Orders assigned to a specific escrow officer
Orders closing in the next seven days
Closed orders with a balance
Stale orders
Once you’ve built a Work List, you can save it and share it with others. Work Lists refresh automatically every five minutes, or you can use the refresh button whenever you need the latest result immediately. You can even open an order directly from the list. It’s a simple way to quickly find what needs your attention.
Need to see information from two different places? SoftPro Select lets you split your screen to view two orders (or tabs) simultaneously. You can view two orders side by side, review a ReadyDoc in preview mode alongside its order, or even drag and drop between orders. No more unnecessary toggling!
With the appropriate SPImage license*, you can annotate documents directly from the Attachments screen in SoftPro Select. Add stamps, signatures, highlights, arrows, sticky notes, and other markups, then save your changes. You can even create custom stamps for frequently used items.
* Availability and pricing may depend on your current licensing. If you don’t have SPImage or are unsure whether it is included in your setup, contact our sales team to learn more.
We know your task and order lists can get quite long, and you don’t want to scroll through every item to find what you need. In SoftPro Select, you can filter My Work item results in both Task Lists and Work Lists by using column headers to narrow what you see, such as a specific task type or due dates within a certain timeframe. Filtering helps you find relevant work and focus on what needs your immediate attention.
Not sure who last worked in an order or when it was saved? Check Order History first. Each time an order is saved, SoftPro Select creates a log showing when it was saved and who saved it. The log also identifies changes to certain high-priority fields and shows when a template was applied. For a closer look at a specific field, place your cursor in that field and press Alt+H to view the history of changes in that field. Some of our trainers even jokingly call it the “tattletale button” because it helps you answer common questions without having to track down a coworker.
One way to keep the documents you use most within easy reach is to add them to Favorites. You can create your own folders and organize frequently used ReadyDocs in the way that works best for you. And because Favorites are unique to each user, you can build a personalized document library that reduces repetitive searching and keeps those everyday resources just a few clicks away.
Make large attachment folders easier to navigate by using document descriptions to identify revisions and versions at a glance. If you need to see everything at once, select the main Attachment folder, click the search field, then press Space + Enter to display documents across all subfolders. This makes it easy to locate files and track revisions.
The Bottom Line
Sometimes, becoming more efficient is as simple as making small improvements to repeated actions that add up across hundreds of orders each year. We encourage you to start with one or two of the tips above that could make the biggest difference to your workflow, then build from there.
If you’re looking for more ways to get the most out of SoftPro, make sure to join us for our free monthly training sessions and Saved You a Seat webinars. They’re a great opportunity to refresh what you already know, discover features you may not be using, and pick up practical tips you can put to work right away.
As a reminder, you can check out two of our most recent Saved You a Seat episodes anytime for demonstrations of many of the tips covered in this article.
For SoftPro Standard and Enterprise users: