Venmo to collect rent payment?

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Matt B.
Investor · Richmond, VA · Member since 2016 · 13 posts · 6 votes
9y

I've been using www.erentpayment.com for a few years now. Nothing but good things to say.   It costs $3 for each monthly transaction or if you have a lot of properties you can pay a monthly fee of like $10 for all.   The tenant submits payment by ACH transaction to erentpayment and then they send it to whatever account you want.  You can have separate accounts for each property if you want and erentpayment sends the email reminders to tenants when rent is due and when its late.  You can set it up so it will only accept full payments and have the late fees built in after a certain day of the month.   If you are really cheap, you can even defer the $3 fee to the tenant.    In addition, if you are the type of landlord to not want rely on unreliable tenants, you can make a tenant sign an authorization that automatically drafts money from their account each month and the tenant cant change or stop the auto drafts or have to be involved at all.   If for some reason they want out, their only recourse is to close the account if its within the scope of the authorization they signed.  

Just having the email reminders and the ability to only accept full payment is easily worth the $3.  

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  • Paul Ronto
    Investor · Fort Collins, CO · Member since 2017 · 169 posts · 119 votes
    9y

    Are you looking for just a way to collect rent or a system that helps you manage your rental all together? There are services that allow you to collect online rent payments as well as have the added functionality to help you manage your properties all in one place for free. To me that's more valuable than venmo.

    Plus on the topic of LLC issues, you can set those online services up with your LLC bank account so renters are depositing directly into your business account.

    An LLC does, in fact, protect you personally from litigation surrounding your rental. You're LLC can be sued, but your personal assets are shielded from things pertaining to your rental, so if you are collecting rent on Venmo to your personal account there could be issues. I'm not 100% sure on this, but I'd be hesitant to collect payment personally for my LLC.

    Hope that helps a bit. 

    1Reply
  • Daniel HymanBusiness Member
    CPA · Milwaukee, WI · Member since 2016 · 2k+ posts · 1k+ votes
    9y

    @Jessica Hawkins Cozy has worked very nicely for us. I do recommend it. It seems like @Paul Ronto offers a nice service as well.

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    1Reply
  • Jessica Hawkins
    Rental Property Investor · Springdale, AR · Member since 2017 · 27 posts · 5 votes
    9y

    @Daniel Hyman and @Paul Ronto thank you!  I will have to check out TurboTenant. 

    1Reply
  • Paul Ronto
    Investor · Fort Collins, CO · Member since 2017 · 169 posts · 119 votes
    9y

    Let me know if you have any questions. Always happy to help!

    1Reply
  • William C.
    Real Estate Agent · Souderton, PA · Member since 2016 · 591 posts · 414 votes
    9y

    Isn't turbo tenant a provider of payment processing?  Venmo is a great option.  It's easy to use and most millennialist are already using it.

    @Paul Ronto are you an attorney? Are you sure all personal assets are protected? If i were to accept a rent payment to a personal Venmo account and deposit it into an LLC bank account. Is that any different from personally receiving a check in the mail, and personally depositing that physical check into my LLC account. It's all the same in my book. There has to be contact to a "personal" item at some point, whether it's my hands or my Venmo account. This is also why I'm curious to know if my personal assets are in fact protected even though there is always a pass through my "personal" hands into and LLC.

    1Reply
  • Paul Ronto
    Investor · Fort Collins, CO · Member since 2017 · 169 posts · 119 votes
    9y

    @William C. no I am not an attorney, which is why I said I was not 100% sure since these can differ for every landlord based on how their LLC is set up or their state or local laws, so I cannot give legal advice, but from my experience and from what my attorney has told me about my LLCs is that if renters pay by check, the checks need to be made out to the LLC business name, not to me personally. If they send me a check made out to me, I return it and ask for another, it's laid out in their lease so I don't have a ton of issues with that, plus I'm collecting online now so that's a thing of the past. Now my tenants pay rent online which directly deposits their rent into my LLC's business bank account. If I were to use a service like venmo I would be very hesitant to have it be my personal account. I think it's safer to have these transactions go directly into your LLC's account. Not sure if you can set up a business Venmo or not, the service I use is simple and easy to set up so no need to investigate further really.

    2Reply
  • Derek Luttrell
    Chicago, IL · Member since 2017 · 231 posts · 124 votes
    9y

    If everyone involved has Chase as their bank, Chase QuickPay makes the money available in your account the minute another member sends it to you. 

    I consider it a perk above Venmo, because with Venmo it takes 2-3 business days to receive the money. The perk with Venmo, though, is that anyone from any bank can send and receive money. As long as the renter is paying from a checking account, they won't pay any extra fees. 

    0Reply
  • Todd Witt
    Investor · Jefferson City, MO · Member since 2015 · 43 posts · 14 votes
    9y
    We set up a separate Venmo account for our rentals with our LLC name and linked to our LLC bank account. You can transfer the money out of the Venmo account with a few clicks immediately after rent is paid and it's in your bank in a few days. Tenants and managers both love it.
    0Reply
  • Adrian Smude
    Rental Property Investor · Plant City, FL · Member since 2015 · 1k+ posts · 379 votes
    9y

    Great read.  I agree with those that said the Vemno account should be in the same name as the owner of the property. I just started using erentpayment. I also thought of using google wallet.  I believe some of these newer payment options depend on the tenants you attract/want to attract to your place.  I am currently using/shifting away from having tenants make a deposit into a bank account which I move the money out of the next day.  

    1Reply
  • Rich C.
    Rental Property Investor · SC · Member since 2012 · 45 posts · 5 votes
    9y

    @Zac Schmelzer Did you ever obtain information regarding your question about using Venmo if you hold properties in LLC?

    0Reply
  • Zac Schmelzer
    Investor · Galloway, OH · Member since 2014 · 11 posts · 2 votes
    9y
    Rich C. I have not found additional legal advice regarding Venmo linked to personal or business accounts. One of the other posts in this thread mentioned his attorney advised him to do the same as mine did which is only have payments made to the company name. Keep personal name out of it. I have a different bank account for every property. If venmo allows multiple business bank accounts with one phone number associated with it then it might work.
    0Reply
  • Carlos Fernandez
    Investor · Miami, FL · Member since 2015 · 31 posts · 18 votes
    9y

    Sorry to rescue an old thread from the dead, but I'm considering venmo. In side gigs (tutoring, cooking classes), I charge customers via venmo and it's available the next morning in my Chase account. Do larger amounts take longer? 

    I've found Chase to be pretty quick in getting me the money. I used to charge customers with square, and Chase was a day or 2 faster than my other account (I can't remember if it was Wells Fargo or a local credit union). 

    Cheers everybody!

    0Reply
  • Michael Plante
    Deland, FL · Member since 2017 · 2k+ posts · 1k+ votes
    9y

    Does Venmo accept partial payments?

    0Reply
  • Kristina Sparrow
    Investor · Denver, CO · Member since 2013 · 69 posts · 54 votes
    9y

    @Carlos Fernandez larger payments take the same amount of time

    0Reply
  • Steve Miller
    Rental Property Investor · Golden, CO · Member since 2017 · 19 posts · 57 votes
    8y

    Has anyone had experience using Venmo in excess of $5,000/mo? I have been using it for about a year for collecting rent and it is super easy to work with, but coming up is my first month collecting gross rents in excess of that number. Per the Venmo site:

    -Sending Funds: limited at $2999/wk (not really a big deal as I'm almost exclusively collecting and I don't see this being problematic.

    -It also includes the language "the rolling weekly limit of all transfers is $4,999". That implies both inbound and outbound transfers to me, but who knows.

    If this is going to be a problem, I think I'm going to find out pretty quick as everybody pays the 1st of each month. Anybody run into these limits? Staggering the rents seems an alternative if this is a legitimate limit to the platform, but I'd probably go to a new payment platform before I did that.

    0Reply
  • Alex Corbishley
    Minneapolis, MN · Member since 2018 · 31 posts · 20 votes
    8y

    I’m curious about Steve’s question as well.  What happens when collections exceed $5k?

    0Reply
  • Spencer Herrick
    Pittsburgh, PA · Member since 2019 · 40 posts · 16 votes
    2y
    I would also like to learn more about this as I have my rentals under an LLC



    Quote from @Zac Schmelzer:

    I was instructed by my attorney that all rent checks need to be written to my LLC or direct deposit into company accounts. They specifically said do not have tenants write checks to your personal name incase of lawsuits.

    How would Venmo apply in this situation? 

    Note: Each property has it's own bank account too.


    0Reply
  • Samuel CoronadoPro Member
    Investor · Huntsville, AL · Member since 2016 · 348 posts · 182 votes
    2y

    I use CashApp and tenants prefer it. 

    0Reply
  • Steve Babiak
    Real Estate Investor · Audubon, PA · Member since 2009 · 13k+ posts · 8k+ votes
    2y

    I don’t understand why landlords want to use these simple money transfer apps when there are numerous free to use apps specifically intended and designed for rent collection. You get features like automatic late fees and blocking partial payments.

    Makes no sense to me.


    BTW - I use an app called Tellus to collect rent.

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