Please advice on managing rental property

[Muhamed Abd.]

Greetings,

I have been given the shared responsibility of managing apartment complexes owned by the family. I am having hard time to keep track of things. I would appreciate if any one can point me to  a method or software that help me keep track of things. I wonder if there is a smart way on how land lords do these things. Here are some issues I am facing:-

*People pay at different times of the month and in different complexes. Some pay monthly some pay quarterly. Some Pay half now with the promise of completing payments next month.

*People pay in cash, online, and cheques. Making it hard to keep tab on things especially online ones because you can see a bank account but not the name of the account owner. Can't tell who's who.

*Not sure how to keep tab on fixing costs and warranties on devices replaced like water pumps and water heaters. Its paper jungle

*Between 20+ tenants its really hard to know who paid, who is late, and who's contract is over or needs renewing.

I looked up some apps online but most of it seems some corporate sized apps with complex interface which requires subscription and tying bank accounts. I was looking for something more simpler. I wonder if an Excel should should do fine, if so can any one show a template or how I should set it up? Should I hire a 3rd party accountant to do these things? Can I trust him? because I faced many people that will do a sloppy job.

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How do tenants respond to yearly rent increase? Inflation is like 3% yearly, if I do not increase rent 3% yearly then this means i am losing 3% of my income year over year basically decreasing my income by 9% over the course of 3 years not to mention fixing costs. I am becoming poorer not richer. Also rent prices can generally come down based on economic conditions.