9 Ways Your Property Management Tool Can Improve Your Business

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When it comes to managing your tenants and properties, you want to ensure that you’re doing so efficiently. Not only does it help your business stay organized, but it also helps foster a good working relationship with your renters. 

Fortunately, you’re not alone when it comes to managing your real estate business. Using property management software can be an advantage when it comes to cultivating a good landlord-tenant relationship and streamlining how you manage your properties. 

1. Screen Tenants

Finding and screening tenants is a crucial step in managing rental properties. So, you want to make sure that you’re doing it properly. Luckily, property management software can help you manage the process every step of the way—from prescreening to applications to full background reports. 

When you use in-app prequalifications, applications, and tenant screenings, the information is collected and stored in a central location. Background checks done with property management software will provide you with credit, criminal, and eviction reports. Then, you can dive into each application and decide which renters are fully qualified for your rental property based on your requirements for credit score, income, pets, etc.

2. Build a Tenant Database

If you have more than one tenant, it’s difficult to keep track of who lives where, who’s paid what, and who owes money. Using property management software is a great asset when it comes to building a tenant database that manages all this information for you so you’re able to access it at a glance. 

Another benefit is lease and document storage for tenants. You can use property management software to upload electronic documents and store them in the app so that they are easily on hand at all times, especially if you’re using cloud-based software. Property management software also enables you to send these documents to the tenants electronically so they are able to store them in their tenant app as well.

This helps your business stay orderly, so you can keep focused on managing your rentals and not tracking down tenant information or searching for paper leases.

3. Onboard Tenants

When it comes to onboarding your tenants, go over the property and lease rules to make sure your tenants understand their responsibilities for your rental.

Of course, when the tenant signs the lease you might assume they’ve read it over. However, it’s still a good idea to sit down with the tenant and go over any specific duties they might have, like mowing the lawn or making sure the trash is taken out on garbage day. Talking over the property rules and agreements with your tenants ensures both parties understand who is responsible for the different aspects of maintaining the property.

Additionally, going over these responsibilities is a great way to show them you’re communicative while also building a professional relationship with your renters.

4. Connect to Your Tenants

Too often, landlord-tenant relationships become fraught with tension when miscommunications occur. Thankfully, property management software can be a great asset when it comes to making certain that communication occurs with your tenant after you’ve gone over the initial onboarding process with them. Typically, property management technology comes with features you can use to notify your tenants—like push (in-app) or email notifications.

These notifications are helpful for conveying necessary information to your renters. For example, if a tenant submits a repair request for a water leak, you can use property management software to send an in-app and email notification to the tenant when maintenance will be by to fix the issue. You can also use the software to send notifications like automatic rent reminders so that you can reduce the likelihood of your tenants forgetting to pay rent on time.

5. Help Tenants Pay Rent Efficiently

Collecting rent can be chaotic and challenging. You may have one tenant who wants to pay with cash, another with a check, and still another with an app. Fortunately, property management software can handle all rent-paying preferences. Yes, even cash-paying tenants! 

Property management software can have partnerships with businesses like Chime that enable them to create accounts and deposit cash at many in-person locations, then submit the payment via their tenant app. Additionally, you can also offer your tenants the ability to pay with ACH and card so that you’re covered when it comes to all types of payments. 

6. Report On-Time Rent Payments

Some property management software comes with features like credit reporting that enable renters to report their on-time rent payments to credit bureaus. This helps them build and improve their credit score, which is important for many renters in today’s society. 

This can be a great incentive for tenants to pay their rent on time and also shows that you are able to offer progressive features that tenants wouldn’t otherwise have access to outside of using the property management system.

7. Purchase Renters Insurance

Another important benefit that property management software can offer tenants is renters insurance. Many tenants don’t feel the need to buy renters insurance because they mistakenly believe that your landlord insurance covers damages and theft of their personal belongings and liability issues.

However, it’s important to explain that renters insurance is what tenants need to protect their belongings and personal liability for their rental. Fortunately, property management software can enable renters to purchase renters insurance directly in the app, making it a snap to get coverage for their belongings.

8. Manage Maintenance and Repair Requests

Another major hurdle that the landlord-tenant relationship face is maintenance. When tenants notice an issue, they’ll want a way to easily communicate with you about how to resolve it. Property management software is effective in that it provides a way for tenants to submit their maintenance requests via an app straight to you. Then, you can determine the next steps for fixing the repair.

From your end, you can easily assign the repair to maintenance personnel or handle the repair yourself and use the notification features mentioned above to let the tenant know when they can expect the issue to be resolved.

9. Better Tenant Management with Property Management Software

By utilizing technology to manage your rentals, you not only streamline and organize your business, but you also offer your tenants plenty of benefits for using the technology as well. Property management software can also be used to make your tenant’s renting experience better. This can include different options for paying their rent, credit reporting, renters insurance, and maintenance requests.

Overall, property management software is an effective solution you can use to manage your tenants and real estate portfolio. Even better? RentRedi has property management software that is offered for free to BiggerPockets Pro members, who can sign up right from their Pro page. Manage an unlimited number of tenants and properties, collect rent, screen tenants, list properties, sign leases, and handle repairs—all from one app. If you’re not a BiggerPockets Pro member, sign up for all the additional content, advice, and products you can use to manage your entire real estate experience.

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Note By BiggerPockets: These are opinions written by the author and do not necessarily represent the opinions of BiggerPockets.