Insights from our Property Management software search

[Trevor Stone]

Hi BP Community,

I’ve benefited from the BP brain trust when looking for recommendations on property management software so having finally chosen one, I thought I would share my findings in case it helps someone else. This is a little long, but if you want detail, here it comes.

Spoiler alert! We went with Yardi Breeze.

Context and Assumptions:

- We started the search and evaluation in November of 2021 for Jan 2022 implementation.

- Our portfolio has 27 units of small multifamily in Buffalo, NY which we self-manage.

- We are a buy and hold, long-term rental team without any STR's so my search did not consider the specific or unique needs of a short-term rental portfolio.

Your Needs and Business Type:

Choosing a PM platform really depends on what type of role you play in REI and what your needs are. Do you self-manage? Are you a PM exclusively? Do you self-manage and manage for others? Do you focus on short term rentals (STRs) or long-term? What types of assets do you manage? Make sure you consider what you do now and what you plan to get into in the future as those businesses could have different needs and the platforms in the market may address them differently (or not at all).

The Market:

It’s crowded. Even the banks are getting into it (Story by JPMorgan). We started this search because we wanted to automate cash rent collection and it spiraled from there. My research led me to break down the market of property management software into two main segments. I call them ‘Front End Process’ and ‘End to End Property Management’. Platforms in the former category tend to focus on lead generation, unit listing services, tenant acquisition, tenant screening, applications and leases, or online rent collection and unit/tenant/payment tracking. Think, RentRedi, TurboTenant, SchedulemyRent, and NestEgg.rent. The latter category typically offers those features plus double-entry accounting and financial reporting, maintenance work order management, owner portals and reporting, tenant portals and communication, inventory management, utility management, and native or add-on services like cash rent collection, e-signatures, third party app integrations, APIs, etc. 

Because we are growing, it was worth focusing on the end-to-end platforms so the tool could support our growth. That’s where I’ll focus below.

The Players:

We formally evaluated four platforms after market research and chats with other professionals. By formally, I mean web research, calls with Sales, product demos, and free trial evaluations. We eliminated Appfolio as it seemed focused on the big PMs with high minimums for units (50) and monthly fees ($250+). So we focused on:

DoorLoop

This was the youngest, web-first platform (2019) in our eval. The product is beautiful, and it was priced competitively, but there were a few features we needed that were still ‘on the roadmap’ - mainly, cash rent collection. The demo of bank rec tools didn’t leave me as confident as other platforms either. It isn’t right for us now, but I like where they are going and will keep an eye on their growth.

Rent Manager

RM has been serving the industry since 1982. I found it VERY robust with incredible detail and additional feature options (they have their own in-app Voip solution) in each subscription tiers. I’ve heard it’s great if you PM for other owners and imagine it can handle very large portfolios well. For us, the detail would be overwhelming. It was also comparatively pricey with a $200/month minimum obligation.

Buildium

Buildium is a web-first platform started in 2002 and has grown into a global, PE-backed player. I think we would have been happy with Buildium. I liked the UI more than Yardi (the free trial performed well) and they offer a stand-alone mobile app and real-time bank transaction synchronization – which Yardi does not. It was the pricing model that gave me pause. At $50/month it’s cheap to start but in the race to one hundred units it quickly became more expensive than Yardi. They also had a $100 per-bank account setup fee at the Essential feature tier that just rubbed me the wrong way. That said, put it on your list to check out because it's a strong contender.

Yardi Breeze

Yardi (corporate) has been around since 1984 and Breeze is the small/mid-market offering based on their enterprise Voyager product. We opted for the Breeze feature tier (we could grow into Breeze Premium). So far so good. We received 8 hours of dedicated phone/Zoom support with an implementation specialist who was VERY knowledgeable. Our main areas of use thus far are managing the properties, units, tenants, rent roll, and the double-entry accounting suite. There are quirks – a dedicated URL rather than logging in on the public site and a mobile-responsive site rather than a phone app. We will be enrolling tenants in the tenant portal for online and retail (cash) payments and will begin using the maintenance work orders this quarter. Feel free to check in with me in a few months for an update.

Conclusion:

Remember, your tools have to support your business model and process. So get clear on what you need from a tool and what things you will not sacrifice to protect yourself from shiny object syndrome. Then try out the options that seem like a close fit. Ask around BP for real user opinions and keep an eye on the market as new players are entering all the time. I hope my experience gave you some things to think about and even some options to evaluate for yourself. 

Good luck!