Best Property Management Software

Property management software (PMS) is used by real estate companies to manage all aspects of their properties. There are scores of quality platforms in this niche. This makes it hard to do informed comparisons to choose the best property management software for your requirements. We make your work easier with this buyer’s guide which educates on you the key features and factors that separate the best property management software from the average programs.

Start your search by registering for the free trial or demo of leading tools. Top property management software providers offer this facility to help you test their platform’s main features and do an overall comparison with other applications. We recommend you try out AppFolio, Buildium, Rentec Direct, Propertyware, and Rent Manager. These property management tools have won impressive ratings and rankings in our property management software reviews.

Property management tools are generally utilized by real estate and property management companies. The latter use the platform to track profits, costs, and marketing of their properties. Property owners can monitor maintenance work and ensure their tenants pay rent on time. Multiple home owners and real estate investors also benefit by using this application as it automates key tasks and eliminates old-fashioned methods such as utilizing paper or spreadsheets to take care of their properties.

1. AppFolio: An online solution that is packed with property management and accounting tools. You can use it to centralize key processes such as online lease agreements, online rent payments, applicant screening, marketing, accounting and more. AppFolio offers a clutter-free user interface and streamlines all property management workflows. It functions well with a range of properties including student housing, commercial, residential, and HOA.
2. Buildium: A cloud-hosted system that enables property managers to fully control all elements of their business including key operations such as leasing and accounting. Plus, they can efficiently handle their vacancy, maintenance, and rental cycles. The best part is Buildium enables you to receive rents on time and sends automatic notifications to tenants if payments are late. You can let this solution take care of routine operational tasks and focus on important work.
3. Rentec Direct: An web-based software for landlords, property managers, and associations. The highlight is the tool’s comprehensive general ledger and property accounting feature that helps you to effortlessly maintain tenant, property, and bank records. The application provides a professional website where you can advertise property vacancies along with their images, details, and prices. In addition, it enables you to publish vacancies on popular rental property sites such as Craigslist and others.
4. Propertyware: A scalable and versatile software designed for small, low density, and single-family residential properties. This cloud-hosted application combines property accounting, management, and marketing functions in a single, sophisticated solution. You can use it to significantly reduce costs while increasing revenues from your properties. This platform is ideal for fee managers, REO/asset managers, and landlords.
5. Rent Manager: A PMS that offers robust features to empower property managers and rental service businesses to do their work efficiently and effectively. It takes care of all financial aspects to help you maintain a transparent relationship with your clients. This platform has been around for thirty years and therefore its feature set is detailed and versatile, which makes it attractive for realtors. Finally, you can use Rent Manager’s API to integrate it with the other systems and apps you use.

PMS is a generic term that includes the following sub-categories:

• HOA management software
• Affordable housing software
• Vacation rental property software
• Maintenance management software
• Property management accounting software
• Rental property management software
• Apartment management software
• Facilities management software

1. Tenant portal. This portal enables tenants to communicate with their landlords, place maintenance requests, and remit rent online. Tenants can access the portal through the web or via their mobile devices.
2. Owner portal. Enables property owners and managers to do tasks such as getting info on the financial performance of a property, collecting rents from tenants, sharing documents and others.
3. Rental listings. You can market your properties by posting rental listings on leading real estate sites such as Trulia and Zillow. Top vendors like Propertyware offer a dedicated site creation service to enable managers to advertise vacant properties.
4. Maintenance management. This feature is also called work order tracking and it helps owners to track property maintenance requests. Tenants can submit such requests via the platform which can also schedule repeat tasks. Property owners and managers can delegate work orders to employees and vendors, monitor the maintenance work, and remit payments to vendors.
5. Lease management. These features include electronic signatures, document storage, rental applications, and property marketing. Property managers can utilize these lease management features to get an electronic trail of the whole leasing process, which saves time and paper.
6. Accounting features. Common accounting functionality includes electronic funds transfer, tax filing, bank reconciliation, and monitoring receivables and payables. These features could be inbuilt or the software can be connected with a third-party accounting solution.

1. Minimizes administrative tasks. Using spreadsheets or paper is old fashioned and time-consuming especially when managing multiple properties and tracking the rent payments of all the tenants. PMS is a single solution that enables you to manage multiple properties easily and efficiently.
2. Facilitates quicker payments. The software’s accounting features enable you to review the rent to be collected and invoices to be paid. You can create alerts to remind tenants to make rent payments on time. Plus, the software enables tenants to make payments online.
3. Improves communication between owners and tenants. Collaboration features assist property managers to easily contact tenants and owners. Tenants can use an online portal provided by the software to communicate with their landlord, place maintenance requests, etc.
4. Offers enhanced convenience. Tenants can use the online tenant portal to pay rent at their convenience. Plus, they can contact the maintenance staff and property office, and get notified about key developments and announcements.
5. Provides financial insight. Analytics and reporting tools help you collect marketing, tenant, and financial data from which you can spot trends that could be impacting your business or offer opportunities to carry out improvements.

Increase in global demand. Industry reports predict that the global property management software market is set to grow at a CAGR of 6.77% until 2020. One of the reasons behind this demand is that real estate agents and property managers need a tool to manage the large volumes of data they collect from multiple sources. PMS also offers them access to proprietary data. In addition, the growth in the rental market is expected to make more property managers invest in quality PMS solutions.

Sophisticated technology for tenant background checks. Traditionally, tenant background checks involved getting info on their criminal record if any, employment details, rental history, and credit history. Now, advanced technology is helping property owners and managers to conduct more detailed background checks. These include scores for each applicant to determine if they pass or fail based on criminal, credit, and other histories.

High cost. Property management companies that manage a high number of properties need to invest a lot of money to acquire quality property management tools. On top of that, they need to shell out extra for features such as making background checks on tenants. But the high cost is worth it given the many useful features and benefits a good PMS platform offers.

Data security concerns. Some companies may have doubts whether cloud-based PMS solutions offer reliable data security and privacy. Such businesses can opt to buy an on-premise system that enables them to house the data in-house on their company’s servers.