Austin TX Real Estate - Hill Country Austin Lakeway Homes for Sale: Infrared Lock Boxes by Supra

Infrared Lock Boxes by Supra

How many areas out there are using the new slate blue colored infrared lock boxes instead of the ugly beige lockboxes?  I liked the old ones because you could keep you eKey in the holder while you show, whereas the new ones require you to carry the darn eKey with you as all you do is point it at the box.

Supra has offered us through December to turn in all of our old lockboxes and buy the new ones for only $10.83 a piece!!  What a deal!!  After December, they won't even look at the old lock boxes and the new ones will cost full price at $96 and some change.  Two of the lock boxes I turned in were brand new!  They still had the CBS code paper on them.  I had just bought them about 3 months ago...

We were supposed to go to infrared about 4 years ago when they gave us new eKeys, but about 50 people got the wrong eKeys and instead of trying to figure out who those people were, they just decided to not do infrared... here it is over 4 years later, and we had a massive eKey exchange about 2 months ago.  I was one of them.  My cradle was not on the recall list... but it was, indeed, the wrong cradle as it drained my battery on showing day!!  I had the pleasure of going into their offices the next day with a very "pleasant" attitude (those of you who know me know it wasn't pleasant).  They immediately gave me a new cradle and all is well now.

Anyway, who else across the country has this new lockbox from Supra? 

13 comments • Donna Harris, REALTOR®, CDPE & ASP - Hill Country Austin Lakeway Homes • August 21 2006 07:07PM

Comments

They changed us in central Florida a while back...yes the new boxes are more expensive...I use pushbutton lockboxes and combination boxes...they are MUCH cheaper....
Posted by Chicago, Illinois real estate ---- Alexander Harb (My Real Estate Referral L.L.C.) almost 6 years ago
Many of the brokers in my market don't "allow" combination locks unless it's vacant.  They're easier to break into so it's a security thing.
Posted by Donna Harris, REALTOR®, CDPE & ASP - Hill Country Austin Lakeway Homes (RE/MAX Austin Skyline) almost 6 years ago

We have had those boxes here in Crossville, Tn for several years. In Knoxville they just changed a few months ago and they were exchanging the old for the new for free!! Go figure

Posted by Pam Hofmann - Your Crossville, Lake Tansi & Fairfield Glade Specialist (Third Tennessee Realty & Associates, LLC) almost 6 years ago
They're about 120 bucks here, but these things are cool.  You can enter codes so that agents can't show your properties without notifying you, and you can track who's been in and out and report back to the owner.  Way more secure, too.
Posted by Jonathan Greene (Team Greene Realty) almost 6 years ago
Donna, we have them here in Cedar Rapids, Ia.  The hard part for me is when the box is not attached to the door knob and it is standing alone.  Then you have to hold the box in one hand and the supra key in the other, and when the time is right, push the bottom of the box to release the key holder from the bottom.  It took me a few times to get the hang of that one!
Posted by Christopher Smith (TREGO REALTY) almost 6 years ago
We just went through a mandatory conversion last month in the Mpls/St. Paul area. What a mess. We had one week to switch and it was anybody's guess what kind of lockbox was on a listing. I like the new system, except I'm having trouble syncing my key. I had to exchange my phone cradle for a USB cradle since I use Vonage. The autosyncing that should take place at night is unreliable. sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. It always works manually, but that's kind of a pain.
Posted by Terry Moravec (Keller Williams Premier Realty) almost 6 years ago
Sounds like North Texas is definitely behind the times!!  I have Vonage, but have one regular phone line with no features on it, so the key updates on that.  Before we got Comcast (time warner- road runner), SBC (now at&t) wouldn't allow dsl service without at least a basic phone line, so that's the only reason I have it.
Posted by Donna Harris, REALTOR®, CDPE & ASP - Hill Country Austin Lakeway Homes (RE/MAX Austin Skyline) almost 6 years ago
We have them here in Washington State. I use my Treo 650 as my e-key so I don't have to carry anything else with me. I like the infra-red feature that these boxes offer. Many times agents here would leave their keypad in the grey box and walk away. We've have the infra-red blue boxes for three years now and they are great. I love the e-feed back on the supra web site so I know who was in my listing immediately.
Posted by Karen Villa Schweinfurth, ABR, CRS, SRES, CyberStar (RE/MAX Northwest Realtors, Inc. 425-308-3669) almost 6 years ago
We have the new boxes in Austin - they changed them out last year sometime. I never used the old ones so can't compare - but no complaints about the newer boxes.
Posted by Linda Mardi (AuctionFirst) almost 6 years ago

We have both the new blue boxes and the old beige boxes.

I've found it easier to use the old boxes as they seem more reliable. I've had to wait 5 minutes in some cases while the keypad searches on the new supra boxes.

I believe that the cost for the new ones is around $100.

We did our conversion several years ago. And, I just hate having to call a listing office to get a punch combo box code. I guess that they don't know that the supra ekeys record who is going into the property.

Posted by Eileen Landau, ABR, CRS, e-PRO (BAIRD & WARNER, NAPERVILLE) almost 6 years ago
I like having only having to remember one code to get into all of the houses.  I could not imagine having to know five different combos for five different houses!  I guess I haven't known any other way...
Posted by Deleted Account (Delete) almost 6 years ago
Oh, yeah.  Our board rents the lockboxes out to us.  We have to pay $100+ if we loose one, but it's only a dollar a month to rent.
Posted by Deleted Account (Delete) almost 6 years ago
We just changed to the new boxes last month.  We did a one for one exchange on the boxes but had to pay to upgrade the eKey.
Posted by Donna Quanrud Realtor® Minnetonka Minnesota Fine Homes (Coldwell Banker Burnet) almost 6 years ago

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