Tell Me More: Rental Management Software

Rental management software helps building managers and landlords maintain their apartment properties, including both tenant- and building-related matters.

Rental management software features
Most rental management software programs include modules that address four primary property-related issues:

• Tenant – Track current and previous tenant details, including contact information, rent payment history, credit report data, vehicles, and incidents.
• Real estate – Manage information for each building and unit. Track data points such as mortgage payments, improvements, appliance purchases, repair history, and unit condition.
• Income and expenses – Keep a log of incoming payments from tenants and expenses related to managing and marketing your properties. The right rental management software should organize this information in a way that makes it easy to prepare your records at tax time.
• Reporting - All software will offer some level of reporting on income, rental records, and schedules. Take the time to view the specific reports you need most often. Also, check that data can be easily exported to spreadsheets if you need to manipulate the data further.

Forms and templates
Some rental management software also provides templates so you can auto-generate forms, letters, and reports. These can range from rental applications and late fee reminders for tenants to maintenance notification letters to vendors.

User interface
While most rental management software offers similar sets of features, each will have a different way of doing so.

Take the time to compare the user interface across the programs. Start with an online demonstration and then see if you can get trial copies of the software to test. Go through the your most common tasks, like entering payments or creating unit reports, to see how easy the software is to use. The best programs will be intuitive to use from the beginning. You can compare different feature sets from multiple apartment management software providers before you make a purchase.

Choosing rental management software providers
Let BuyerZone’s exclusive network of rental management software vendors help you accurately track your rental properties today. Use our free request for maintenance management software price quotes, and up to six different vendors will compete for your business and find you the best solution.