What the homeowner project portal does
The portal is a private, contact-specific page inside GHL Sites that every homeowner gets on day one of their project. It’s the single place they go when they want to know what’s happening — instead of calling your PM at 7:30 AM asking “are the framers coming today?”
- Live schedule view — the current week’s trade schedule (demo Mon-Tue, framing Wed-Fri, etc.), with planned dates and any approved slips.
- Photo timeline — every geo-tagged photo your crew uploads appears here in reverse-chronological order with captions.
- Change order log — every change order, signed or pending, with the dollar delta and approval status.
- Invoice + draw schedule — what’s been billed, what’s been paid, what’s coming next per the signed draw schedule.
- Punch-list tracker — once you hit substantial completion, the live punch list with status per item.
How it works under the hood
The portal isn’t a standalone app — it’s a GHL Sites page filtered by the logged-in contact’s data, so there’s no second login for the homeowner to manage:
- Magic-link auth — homeowner clicks the link in their kickoff email (or any subsequent SMS) and lands on their portal logged in via GHL’s contact-token URL.
- Custom field rendering — the portal reads the contact’s project stage, schedule custom fields, photo gallery, and pipeline opportunity data and renders the slices that matter.
- Photo sync — the geo-tagged photo workflow pushes every approved crew photo to the contact’s media gallery, which the portal pulls.
- Change order + invoice embed — signed change orders and invoices appear via the Documents & Contracts integration.
- Auto-refresh — every page load pulls fresh data. No “publishing” step for the PM.
Mid-project Wednesday — manual updates vs the portal
Homeowner texts PM 7:15am 'are framers coming today?' → PM responds 8:30 → homeowner asks 'what about the window upgrade?' 11am → PM digs through emails → answers 2pm → 4 follow-up texts by 6pm
Homeowner opens portal 7:15am → sees framers on schedule Wed-Fri, last photo from yesterday's demo, change order #2 pending signature → texts PM zero times → PM ships work
What it’s NOT
- Not a Buildertrend / CoConstruct replacement for complex new builds. If you run 40+ subs on a custom home with daily logs, RFIs, and submittals, you need a heavier tool. The portal is for remodels and small new builds where the homeowner mainly needs visibility, not collaboration.
- Not a message board. The portal is one-way: you publish, they view. Two-way conversations stay in SMS so they’re searchable and don’t fragment across tools.
- Not a document vault. Long-term storage of permits, warranty docs, and plans is handled by your existing storage (Dropbox, Google Drive). The portal links out to them; it doesn’t host them.
- Not visible to anyone without the magic link. No public URL, no Google indexing, no risk of the neighbor finding it.
Why portal traffic predicts project health
Homeowners who check their portal 2-4 times per week leave 4.7-star reviews and refer at 3x the rate of homeowners who never log in. Homeowners who check the portal daily are anxious — that’s the PM’s signal to do an in-person walk-through within 48 hours. Homeowners who never check the portal are usually fine, but worth a proactive Friday SMS so they don’t feel ignored.
The portal isn’t just a deflection tool. It’s a project-health dashboard that surfaces anxiety before it turns into a 1-star review.