For the last four years, real estate trainer Stephen Canale has loaded one financial program after another into his PDA looking for the one that does just the right calculations, quickly and easily.

"What I've personally found is that the available Palm-based financial calculators suffered from one of two problems," says Canale. "Many tried to do too much, in the process making them overly complicated and difficult to use on a PDA. Others did the right things, but were poorly designed, without a real understanding of how consumers use PDA's, again making them unnatural and inconvenient to use."

Either way, the result was always the same. After a month or two Canale says he found himself reaching for his Hewlett Packard financial calculator or running the financial software installed on his notebook computer.

"One day, I had the idea that a well-designed financial Palm utility would be a great promotional "giveaway," recalls Canale. "More functional than a fly-swatter or "chip clip" with a higher perceived value than both, and easier to distribute, too."

So, he decided to create a mortgage calculator for the Palm that would achieve two related goals:

It had to be designed around what agents, builders and even loan officers actually wanted and needed, and also had to function so easily and reliably that people would still use it months, and even years, after they first loaded the software.

Second, the program could be used as a personal promotional tool.

"One day it hit me - if I could use this tool as a personal promotional tool, why couldn't agents, brokers, builders and lenders do the same?" says Canale. "I realized that the ability to give away an elegant financial calculator was even more valuable to professionals that interact with consumers, than it was to me professionally!"

" What buyer wouldn't want such a tool? How many sellers would want this tools when it came time to refinance their home or to estimate their outstanding mortgage balance before sale?" he says.

And that epiphany gave birth to two versions of what is now being called Canale Calc - financial software for the Palm.

"The first is a free Palm-based calculator that I can give away to brokers, agents and other real estate professionals," explains Canale. "It's free to them, but whenever they run the software, the introduction screen reminds them of my services. For me it's a promotional tool, for them it's a functional tool."

"The second version of the software is a *personalized* copy of the software that promotes the agent, builder or lender who pays for it," he says. "Whenever the consumer runs the program, the personalized version includes a promotional introduction screen that reminds them of exactly which agent, builder or lender gave them this tool."

Compared to other promotional tools such as chip clips, calendars, jar opens and pens, the perceived value of the Canale Calc has the potential to be more appreciated by consumers since it relates directly to the homebuying process.

Distributing it is easy, says Canale. "You can distribute it by e-mail, web site posting, floppy disk or direct beaming from PDA to PDA."

The price is right, too. A one-time charge of $49 per customer allows agents, brokers, builders, and lenders to distribute as many copies as they wish.

Published: October 29, 2001

Use of this article without permission is a violation of federal copyright laws.