What programs do you use for Accounting & Property Mangement?

Question

Hello,

We  have been looking for a program(s) to help out with both the accounting  side of our rental property business and also the 'management side of  things'. If we could find this all in one program that is easy to use  and online that would be great, but not sure if that is out there.

From  my reading a looking a a few so far it seems like Rentec Direct and  Xero Accounting are both well thought of platforms. We have 14  units  currently and are going to be adding at least 12 more in the next few  months and would like to get somethings set up ASAP before that to be  ready from the start to try to stream line things.

My questions are;

1)  Does Rentec have all of the accounting features we would need? There  are 3 partners that each own units on our own, along with units we own  together in 2 different LLC's,  one for traditionally financed properties and on for those we own in  our SDIRAs. 2) Is there anything that Rentec does NOT do on the  accounting side that you wish it would?

2) Xero looks very robust  on the accounting side of things. I also have a 'day job' construction  business that we use Peachtree Accounting for and I would consider  moving that over to Xero too possibly. The feeling I get from watching  some of the 'demos' on Xero though is that they might not have as many  good 'property management' features as what Rentec does?

Am I on  the right track thinking Rentec has more 'lanlord' features but less  accounting features that Xero? Does a landlord with say under 50 units  need the (potential) more powerful accounting that Xero might offer?

Thanks, Dan Dietz

Ashley Ben · Answer

@Daniel Dietz for the accounting i suggest looking into quickbooks. For property management depending how many units you have - if you have a lot consider buildium or one of those solutions. If you're like me, you might fall in love with rentigo (it's free and you can collect rent online - not too many options but that makes it easy to use in my opinion!)

Chris Walters · Answer

I've been researching this info for the past 5 hours. I found a ton of reviews and opinions and it is very confusing. For sure there are many factors to take in account.

What I found is that many people tend to recommend QuickBooks for the accounting side. I too am seeking a software that can provide both a solid accounting aspects and property management tracking capabilities.

On the property managing side, I found Buildium, Propertyware,  and Rentec direct.

I am leaning towards purchasing 2 different software programs, because when scouting accountants, one of my questions was what software they recommend for me to do my own bookkeeping and will be easier for them when comes time for tax season and other events. Most of them recommended Quickbooks and I heard "Sage" a few times.

If someone can please expand on this topic, because I too am very curious. I might start off by purchasing Quickbooks in order to keep track of my business expenses and all. Then if I feel the necessity to really get a PM software, I might opt towards Buildium.

Thanks for the amazing topic @Daniel Dietz

George P. · Answer

and it's $100 around the holidays.

George P. · Answer

quicken property management. own and manage 35.

99.99% amazing. i can split and enter transactions for 15 houses in 22 seconds.

i can create report for whichever house in 2 clicks. maybe one click if it's set up right.

Jason Hartley · Answer

@Daniel Dietz, I haven't used Xero, but I am very familiar with Rentec Direct (5+ years, over 90 units).  From a general perspective I can definitely say though (after looking at Xero's website briefly) that Xero is a general accounting platform similar to Quickbooks.  It's probably going to be slightly stronger on the detailed accounting (cpa level stuff) than Rentec, but Rentec is going to be much stronger on the tenant and landlord specific stuff.  For example, Rentec is going to let you do online ACH payments with your tenants and provide them a portal to check their accounts, etc.  My experience is that tenants LOVE this stuff.

You mentioned you and others own the same units.  The only thing you may not be able to do with either of the platforms is provide reports specific to ownership percentages.  But running a P&L, exporting to Excel and dividing things up by the percentages would be easy enough.

For your construction day job, probably QB Online or Xero would be the way to go.  For the landlord stuff, definitely go with Rentec.