What’s your opinion of apartments.com

[Joe Frank]

I’m new to the rental business. I’m using apartments.com to accept applications and rent. I’ve had a few tenants and potential tenants complain about the difficulty to signup, and sign the lease. Have you guys had any issues? Is the service much different since Cozy merged with apartments.com? What would be a better service?

[Jody Sperling]

I did find it a bit cumbersome to sign up with Apartments.com and it was somewhat challenging for my tenants too. There's always that initial stress that they will sign up on time for the first recurring payment, but I've ultimately never had an issue. Once adjusted, I found it as good as Cozy and haven't tried any other services, because it's hard to beat free!

Once Apartments.com is going the money comes without much thought. i check on the first to see that the transaction has initiated then again on the eighth to see that the money deposited. Otherwise, it's like a good dog and walks itself.

You might consider handling the lease portion yourself to alleviate that portion of the stress. I have my own lease and handle it with a paper document, that way I can walk the tenants through the property on move-in day with a move-in checklist and a short tone-setting discussion of what I expect from anyone who rents one of my properties. Thus far, doing this seems to have helped me avoid any misunderstanding and poor behaviors. Best of luck to you!