Custom CRM, HubSpot or Odoo: how to decide

If your sales team runs on spreadsheets, WhatsApp and memory, sooner or later someone says “we need a CRM”. The next question is harder: do we pay for HubSpot, set up Odoo or build our own?

We build custom CRMs, so we have an obvious interest. That is why we start with the honest part: many companies do not need one. This guide helps you see which group you are in.

All three handle the same basics (customers, deals, tasks and follow-ups), but they are paid for and adapted very differently.

• HubSpot. A cloud CRM that is pleasant to use and strong on marketing: emails, forms, automations. There is a free tier to start. You pay per user, and automation lives in the expensive plans.
• Odoo. An ERP with a CRM module: sales, invoicing, inventory, purchasing and HR in one system. Cheaper per user, but it almost always needs a partner to configure it.
• Custom CRM. A system built around your process. You pay for development once, then hosting and maintenance. No per-user fee, and the code is yours.

These are the list prices each vendor published in November 2026, billed annually, excluding VAT. They are rounded: both vendors change prices often, and the exact figure depends on the country and the current promotion.

A per-user price looks small until you multiply it. Take a team of 10 people using the CRM every day for 3 years:

• HubSpot Sales Hub Professional: 10 users × €90 × 36 months = €32,400, plus about €1,500 onboarding. Roughly €34,000 in licences, before the time spent configuring it.
• Odoo Standard: 10 users × about €20–25 × 36 months = €7,200–9,000 in licences. If you need Studio or an API connection, you move to Custom and the figure rises by about 50%. Partner implementation comes on top.
• Custom CRM: a one-off development fee (a simple CRM from €2,500 + VAT; one with integrations costs more), plus hosting and maintenance. Hiring 5 more people does not change the bill.

The conclusion is not “custom is always cheaper”. With 2 or 3 users and a simple process, free HubSpot or Odoo Standard win easily. The conclusion is that you have to compare with your own headcount over several years, not with the first month’s price.

HubSpot is a good choice if:

• Your sales follow a classic funnel: lead, meeting, proposal, close.
• Email marketing and lead forms are an important part of your business.
• You have few users, or only a few of them need paid features.
• You want to start tomorrow, with no development, and you accept working the way HubSpot suggests.

Odoo fits if:

• Besides a CRM you need invoicing, inventory or purchasing, and you want it all in one system.
• You have many users and HubSpot’s per-user price gets out of hand.
• You have a partner you trust to implement and maintain it, or someone in-house who can.
• Your processes look like what Odoo offers out of the box. If not, every change is a developer’s job.

A custom CRM is worth it when one of these applies:

• Your process is your advantage. Workshops with bookings and work orders, dealerships with vehicle stock, clinics with patient records, logistics with routes. If your work does not fit “lead → deal → close”, a standard CRM forces you to work worse.
• You need to connect your own systems. An old ERP, a booking site, a phone system, a customer app. In standard CRMs integrations often require the top plan or a paid connector.
• You have many users. As the team grows, so does the licence. Your own system does not charge per seat.
• You want to own your data and code. Without depending on a vendor changing prices or features.
• You already pay a lot to adapt a standard CRM. If every change in Odoo or HubSpot is a partner quote, you may be building a custom CRM inside another one, and paying for both.

One of ours: for a network of car service centres in Prague we built DriveLab CRM, which handles customers across locations, bookings, service orders and analytics in one system. For Zeekr’s dealer network in Ukraine we built a DMS with 11 modules: vehicle inventory, aftersales, parts, CRM and ERP integration. Neither process fitted a standard CRM without forcing it.

If you recognise three or more, it is worth doing the maths:

• The team keeps a parallel spreadsheet “because the CRM can’t do it”.
• You pay for the expensive plan because of a single feature.
• Every month someone copies data by hand between the CRM and another system.
• The reports you need do not exist, so you build them in Excel.
• There are fields and stages nobody uses because they do not reflect how you sell.
• The bill goes up every time you hire someone.

You do not always have to choose. Many companies use HubSpot for marketing and their own system for operations: the lead comes in through a HubSpot form and moves automatically into the system where the service is managed. Or they keep invoicing in Odoo and build only the part Odoo cannot handle.

It is a good way to start small: build what actually sets you apart and leave the standard work to a standard tool.

Not sure about your case? Walk us through your process on a 15-minute call and we will tell you which option makes sense. More on custom CRM development, and all prices on pricing.