How Do You Manage Your Rental Income?

[Derek Clarkson]

Bigger pockets,

I'm struggling with setting up an organized method to keep track of my rental income. I'm leaning towards the simple method of one checking and one savings account for each rental. This is great, until the savings account only holds the security deposit by Tennessee law and no other transactions can be made out of this account.

I would like to hold my cash flow in a separate account, but I guess this is not necessary.

Also I don't know if this happens, but what about cashing the check from the renter and only depositing enough money each month to cover the mortgage payment? Thus, showing a loss come tax time? Is this legal?

I was interested to see how others structure their rental income accounts. I want to keep everything separate from my personal accounts. Any comments are very appreciated.

-Derek

[Brent Paul]

Me personally I like having each property in a separate account. Helps me keep track better and if my account gets frozen for fraud activity I don't have to worry about all my money being in one account.  I have my account set to automatically do transfers one at a time to a separate account just for cash flow.

It's a little trial and error to find what works best for you.