Buildium: Stand Alone Property Management Software?

[Zachary C.]

Hello Property Managers and Investors,

I would like to start a productive little discussion on Buildium. The other day I briefly looked over the Buildium account of a PM company that has been in business for quite some time. They only utilize certain features of Buildium and I have seen that some others do that as well, supplementing it with Quickbooks, Quicken, etc. If you have experience with Buildium I would love to hear about it, and I am sure others would as well; in-fact if you are interested in seeing some quality answers why don't you vote up this topic.

First, if you don't mind, share a little info to help put your experience with Buildium into perspective; like how long you have used it, around how many doors do you manage with it (your investments, other people investments, or both?), do you use it standing alone or coupled with other platforms (if you started one way and switched, why? which direction?). This should help those (like me) trying to learn about Buildium put your experience and advice into perspective and create a productive environment.

Some specific points:

1. I have seen pretty consistent views that Buildium had good tools and systems for managing the different properties tenants and owners. Things like your screenings, online payments and deposits, lease/rental agreements, etc. One of the area that I have seen a much bigger split in views is accounting. What is your take on the accounting features of Buildium? Is it good for tracking the tenant and owner financial data? How about your financial data as the Property Manager? Can you pull the necessary numbers and/or reports from Buildium that you and your owners will need come tax season to hand off to your tax professional?

2. Aside from the financial reports, how is Buildium for tracking the progress of your company? Are there easy ways to track and view vital information? For instance can you view reports with average data from all of your properties and then also view that same information for individual properties for performance comparisons; like average time between tenants (vacancy rates), avg. maintenance cost, avg. length of stay, and other data that might help you determine a list of top to bottom performers and which you might consider letting go? How about other areas like the average time an owner stays with your management services, how many doors you are adding versus how many you are loosing? If you manage other people properties does Buildium provide the stats that prospective clients typically ask?

3. If there are features that you really love or hate about Buildium, and you didn't already discuss them, please share those with us as well.

Thank you,

[Dawn Brenengen]

@Zachary C. I'll bump this thread.  I use Buildium and have for about three years.  Each year, I utilize more and more features, and they constantly come up with ways to better the program.  It's not perfect, but I don't really have any complaints other than my own inability to figure out all the details.

1.  I use it for online payments from tenants and then to the owners.  I use it for both my own properties and the ones I manage for others.  I use Zipforms and Docusign for leases, and Residential Research for tenant screening.  The accounting works for me, but I have also heard that others have had complaints about it.  I may just not know enough to be disappointed with it, but it works for my needs.

2.  I don't think it provides any statistical data, but I believe you can use it for 30 days or so for free and play with it.  There are a lot of reports available, but I think they are mostly accounting based.  They recently added company accounting to the programs, so you can account for your operating expenses as a OM company, not just the expenses related to the properties.

3. I could use some one on one training, which they have for new clients, but they do not take the time with existing clients to support them.  They do have great support by phone if you call with a specific question, but no overall, step by step training modules.