Constellation HomeBuilder Systems vs. NetSuite ERP

NEWSTAR and its ecosystem are well-suited for any
homebuilder looking to manage end-to-end operations with software they can rely
on. It is a powerful tool supported by many modern integrations to benefit the
entire homebuilding business. It would be less applicable for businesses like trades or commercial builders

NetSuite suits a mid-sized company best where the organization uses multiple currencies in its day-to-day transactions. NetSuite is ready-to-use for businesses that follow financial standards. The more custom business processes there are, the more implementation is required. I would not recommend NetSuite to a large organization due to its performance issues. Additionally, the in-house bank reconciliation tool is not user-friendly for business purposes.

Incentivized

• BuildTopia excels at contract management. Every part of the contract process is able to be managed electronically from initial signing to closing, and can even handle more special cases like contingencies.
• BuildTopia manages all of our construction efforts well. All of our floorplans are pre-build in the system, so all we have to do is go in an build out the construction schedule from a pre-made template, and make any alterations from there.
• The selections process is always a headache, but BuildTopia makes it pretty painless. Everything is loaded right in to the system while making selections with the client, and more detailed things, like non-standard options, are easy to load in and process.

Incentivized

• Customizable Reports and Saved Searches allow much more maneuverability
• Elimination Entries that are driven by advanced intercompany journal entries
• Journal Entries can be entered in as basic or advanced intercompany to better represent the type of transaction occurred for reporting purposes
• Training through the LCS module can help shed knowledge on a range of topics at a self paced learning basis
• NetSuite ERP offers to all users a SuiteAnswers platform to pose frequently asked questions with answers generated from a combination of NetSuite ERP experts, users, and more recently AI based.

Incentivized

• Requests for platform enhancements, while easy to submit and get approved, are slow to be turned around...often a year or more passes before they're implemented.
• BuiltTopia, while good for sales and construction, is missing one large thing...a CRM component. The system allows you to manage clients and prospects, but options for email marketing and other CRM-related efforts are lacking.

Incentivized

• Some of the customization options are really complex and can be difficult to figure out without NetSuite ERP direct support.
• The usability is a bit less intuitive than Quickbooks.
• The cost to give someone a license to even just view information in NetSuite ERP is pretty high.

Incentivized

I am not the decision maker for this but I believe our company will be sticking with NetSuite for the long term. A CRM like this is a big investment and not something you move away from quickly and without a lot of planning. There is a lot of data involved and importing that into a new system is no easy task.

The implementations for Constellation’s products are
very well-organized and help make the learning curve as simple as can be.
NEWSTAR is an incredibly powerful platform and the integrations we are using
are modern and easy to adopt.

It's beneficial if you know what you're doing, but it can be very confusing to find what you're looking for, and many things seem overly complicated or require too many steps to accomplish a simple task - which can be overwhelming for someone accustomed to QuickBooks.

Incentivized

It has been very reliable. I can only think of 1-2 times in 4.5 years that we have had issues getting in, and in each case were able to get back in within 1 hour. There has not been a major downtime

Most of the time the performance is very good. Pages load in a few seconds; financial reports take less than 5 seconds; basic searches take a few seconds. But performance can be sporadic throughout the day and cause the run time to triple.

Incentivized

I would like to give 8 rating for NetSuite support and reason for that is below: Whenever we faced any technical or functional issues we tried to reach out to NEtSuite support but response was not immediate. We told them about the urgency of the issue but still we were not getting response on time. Then, we have to reach out to AE to get things resolved.

Incentivized

I had in person training for a day when first got the software. The training was good. The challenge was that there was a large gap between training and when we went live so we forgot quite a lot

Online training is quite strong. I have used for specific pieces of functionality.However it is not sufficient in all areas.

Implementation was fine but could have gone quicker.

NetSuite provided me a implementation guide who I did not think was very knowledgeable.

I recommend that you make sure the organization knows how they are going to use the software and come up with an implementation plan before importing all of the data.

NetSuite by far is the most expensive; However, compared to the 3 systems notated, the overall functionality, capability and reporting advantages make it my top choice for companies experiencing exponential growth across all departments. Its a best in class solution for just about any user.

Incentivized

We have been able to scale our business 25X without any major overhaul with Netsuite. Its dashboard setup makes onboarding new employees very easy and allows data to be shared across multiple offices. Its cloud setup does not put any pressure on IT to scale servers or other infrastructure. We have been able to become much more efficient in all aspects of the business.

• Overall, our company has saved money by being able to shut down all the various platforms we were using for different departments and transition to just BuildTopia.
• Company efforts are more efficient, with all pertinent information being in one place and able to be viewed by everyone as needed.
• Efforts of the sales team are better able to be managed and reviewed from afar whereas we only had physical paper trails before.

Incentivized

• NetSuite ERP data is used for material reporting. That is like balance sheet and profit and loss reporting. It plays a key role in financial data management.
• Too many customisation become hard to manage in over a period of time.
• High cost licensing.

Incentivized