I stopped paying my property manager $7,200/year — here's how I self-manage 5 units

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I stopped paying my property manager $7,200/year — here's how I self-manage 5 units

Hassan Na
Member since 2026 · 3 posts · 13 votes

Hey everyone,

For about two years I was paying a property manager 10% on 5 units averaging $1,200/mo. That's $600/month, $7,200/year — and honestly, I was still doing half the work. Approving maintenance, chasing updates, answering tenant questions they forwarded to me anyway.

So I fired them and went full DIY. Here's what I learned after making the switch:

The hard part isn't the work — it's the organization.

Collecting rent, tracking leases, handling maintenance requests — none of it is complicated on its own. The problem is keeping it all straight across multiple units without things slipping through the cracks. I tried the spreadsheet route. It lasted about three months before I missed a lease renewal and had a tenant go month-to-month without realizing it.

What actually helped me get organized:

  • Setting up automated rent reminders so I'm not the one texting tenants on the 1st
  • Having one place to see which units are paid, which are late, and which leases are expiring
  • Letting tenants submit maintenance requests somewhere I can actually track them instead of random texts at 11pm
  • Keeping expenses categorized all year instead of scrambling at tax time

I ended up building a tool to handle all of this because the existing options were either way too expensive or built for 200+ unit portfolios. 

What's everyone else using to stay organized? Curious if I'm the only one who failed at the spreadsheet method.

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John MorganPro Member
Rental Property Investor · Grand Prairie, TX · Member since 2018 · 2k+ posts · 2k+ votes
8mo

I’ve never used a PM. It’s easy to do. I self manage my 33 properties and find it easy. Plus it saves me around 40k/year to do it myself. I’ll take that 40k/year and go buy another house with it. lol. 14 of them are out of state and those seem to be just as easy to self manage. I don’t do any of the work. I’m lazy. I just text someone to go fix whatever the issue is. Then I pay them when they’re done. I’ll send my handyman their number to coordinate a good time to fix whatever. Done. Today I had a fridge go out. I asked my tenant if they could go find a new fridge they wanted and I’d pay for it. He found a new one for $550 and sent me the receipt. I cash apped him the money. Done. Yesterday I had a rodent problem at a house. I sent the pest control people my tenant’s number to coordinate a day and time to come out. Done. I accept payments a number of ways including Cash App, Venmo, Apple Pay, PayPal, chime, cash and apartments.com. I try to put most of them on apartments.com since it’s easier. But several people hate using the pay portal on apartments.com for some reason. lol. So I don’t care how they pay me. Doesn’t matter. I do my leases with apartments.com too. It’s easy and free. And I test new handymen near my rentals when I have issues. I use a few different ones so I can get someone out there within 24 hours to fix problems. I don’t want to have to rely on one handyman or one hvac guy to fix something. I want it fixed today. Not 3 days from now when they have time. And so does my tenants. Especially if it’s the heater or AC. Taking care of my tenants in a timely manner is important to me. Turnovers will crush your profits so I treat my tenants well so they’ll stay with me for many years. I don’t want them to ever leave and I tell them they can stay forever when they move in. I work with them too, if they’re late on rent etc. I find if I take care of them and treat them well, they’ll take care of me with all the (tax free) $ they’re sending me monthly while paying off my mortgages.

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  • Richard F.
    Honolulu, HI · Member since 2008 · 3k+ posts · 2k+ votes
    6mo

    Well, here's the OTHER, other side: As a licensed Realtor/PM for nearly 30 years, I cannot even count the number of Owners whose properties we refused to manage due to poor condition and Owner unwilling to commit to clearly necessary repairs, much less upgrades. There have also been a number that were pretty rough, but the Owner initially agreed to a proposed repair/upgrade schedule, but did not follow through. And there were between 200 and 300 units where the Owner agreed, approved contracts we obtained from licensed and insured, vetted, contractors. Every one of those units showed massive income improvements, better quality Tenants, much reduced turnover and repairs at turnover, and increased property values. While several of these Owners were not thrilled with the necessary outlay for updates, without exception every one was very happy...not just when they saw the shiny new unit, but two and three years later when they were appreciating the stable income and quality of the Tenants we placed.

    As I have stated repeatedly on these forums, all PM's are not created equal. Just like auto mechanics and Doctors, there are good ones and bad ones. YOU need to know enough to ask relevant and detailed questions to help separate the good from the bad. HINT: Relying on internet reviews of strangers is of very little use. You have no idea what they consider to be "good", which can be very different from your idea. And of course for newbs, you don't know enough about what actually IS good or bad, to ask useful questions.

    Learning "experiences" in this business are usually very costly. Choose wisely.

    3Reply
  • V.G JasonPro Member
    Investor · Member since 2022 · 3k+ posts · 3k+ votes
    6mo

    Congrats you saved $600/mo to open yourself to even more open ended liability.

    The single dumbest decision in managing risk.

    1Reply
  • John Ledesma
    Member since 2026 · 29 posts · 3 votes
    6mo

    Hassan — curious what you ended up building. The 3-20 unit gap is real and the existing tools handle it poorly — either too lightweight (spreadsheets, Apartments.com) or too heavy (AppFolio, Buildium).

    The maintenance intake piece specifically — how did you solve the "random texts at 11pm" problem? That's usually the last thing people systematize and the first thing that breaks them.

    1Reply
  • Sofia Gutierrez
    Sacramento, CA · Member since 2026 · 9 posts · 4 votes
    6mo

    That's basically it. The 8% stings on the properties that barely cash flow, but the coverage is real. I don't have a backup plan for catching a slow leak under a kitchen sink from 500 miles away during volleyball season.

    0Reply
  • John Ledesma
    Member since 2026 · 29 posts · 3 votes
    6mo

    Sofia — the slow leak from 500 miles away during volleyball season is exactly the right mental model. The PM isn't really solving the distance problem, they're solving the "someone has eyes on it" problem.

    The shift that actually works for out-of-state is building a local response layer — one trusted handyman who gets a text the moment a tenant reports something, before it becomes a $4,000 water damage claim. The PM is just a middleman to that handyman anyway.

    The systems that make out-of-state manageable aren't complicated — they're just intentional. Happy to share the intake setup we use if it's useful.

    0Reply
  • Sofia Gutierrez
    Sacramento, CA · Member since 2026 · 9 posts · 4 votes
    6mo

    The PM does more than relay texts to a handyman though. Mine handles lease renewals, move-in inspections, rent collection, vendor coordination, the whole administrative side I can't run from a classroom. If all they were doing was forwarding maintenance calls I'd agree that's expensive for what it is.

    0Reply
  • Terrance HillPro Member
    Realtor · Memphis, TN · Member since 2010 · 425 posts · 117 votes
    6mo

    Greetings Hassan! Honestly you’re not the only one—the spreadsheet works until it doesn’t, especially once tenants and maintenance requests start stacking up. The organization piece is usually what pushes people back into software or some kind of system once they hit a few units

    0Reply
  • Mark LucidoPro Member
    Investor · The Colony, TX · Member since 2015 · 35 posts · 7 votes
    5mo

    @Hassan Na

    I manage three small commercial properties in the Dallas area and got frustrated enough with spreadsheets that I built my own property management software.

    It handles tenant and lease management, rent rolls, work orders with vendor bidding, communications logging, lease document generation, and financial reporting (NOI, proforma, cap rate). Built specifically for commercial leases — modified gross, NNN, step increases, CPI escalations, the stuff most residential-focused tools handle poorly if at all.

    Would love to share experiences in building our own

    0Reply
  • Mark LucidoPro Member
    Investor · The Colony, TX · Member since 2015 · 35 posts · 7 votes
    5mo

    @Matt Gray

    I manage three small commercial properties in the Dallas area and got frustrated enough with spreadsheets that I built my own property management software.

    It handles tenant and lease management, rent rolls, work orders with vendor bidding, communications logging, lease document generation, and financial reporting (NOI, proforma, cap rate). Built specifically for commercial leases — modified gross, NNN, step increases, CPI escalations, the stuff most residential-focused tools handle poorly if at all.

    Would love to share experiences in building your own

    0Reply
  • Scott Harrington
    Investor · Harrisonville, MO · Member since 2026 · 10 posts · 5 votes
    5mo

    @John Morgan, mad respect for your 33 self-managed properties! I've heard of success stories and horror stories. I am glad you are seeing the successes. I have 20 properties, all out-of-state, and I haven't really contemplated going the self-manage route, though the cost I am paying for a professional PM definitely warrants a reconsideration. I am guessing your investment portfolio is your full-time job?

    To address your question @Hassan Na, there are a number of platforms out there, usually geared more to a Property Management company and less for the individual user. Myself and several other Real Estate Investors who are in the trade of Software Engineering, took on the challenge of getting organized. We created FolioSource to do exactly what you've outlined with setting up automation, tenant tracking, and expense organization. We created this platform to bring all this information together in one place and allow your data to work harder for you. This is not a shameless plug, just a heads up about a tool that might make your already streamlined process even more streamlined. Better yet, we work for the investors, so the project remains flexible and expandable. We want to make investors' lives easier.

    0Reply
    • John MorganPro Member
      Rental Property Investor · Grand Prairie, TX · Member since 2018 · 2k+ posts · 2k+ votes
      5mo

      @Scott Harrington 

      No, I have a full time job but find that self managing 38 rentals is pretty easy. The 20 I have out of state are actually the easiest somehow. The 3 co-living rent by the room houses near me are the most time consuming I'd say. But with today's technology and ease of communication through text messaging, I'd say self managing rentals is pretty easy. 

      1Reply
  • Jimmy LieuBusiness Member
    Real Estate Agent · Columbus, OH · Member since 2019 · 3k+ posts · 2k+ votes
    5mo
    Quote from @Hassan Na:

    Hey everyone,

    For about two years I was paying a property manager 10% on 5 units averaging $1,200/mo. That's $600/month, $7,200/year — and honestly, I was still doing half the work. Approving maintenance, chasing updates, answering tenant questions they forwarded to me anyway.

    So I fired them and went full DIY. Here's what I learned after making the switch:

    The hard part isn't the work — it's the organization.

    Collecting rent, tracking leases, handling maintenance requests — none of it is complicated on its own. The problem is keeping it all straight across multiple units without things slipping through the cracks. I tried the spreadsheet route. It lasted about three months before I missed a lease renewal and had a tenant go month-to-month without realizing it.

    What actually helped me get organized:

    • Setting up automated rent reminders so I'm not the one texting tenants on the 1st
    • Having one place to see which units are paid, which are late, and which leases are expiring
    • Letting tenants submit maintenance requests somewhere I can actually track them instead of random texts at 11pm
    • Keeping expenses categorized all year instead of scrambling at tax time

    I ended up building a tool to handle all of this because the existing options were either way too expensive or built for 200+ unit portfolios. 

    What's everyone else using to stay organized? Curious if I'm the only one who failed at the spreadsheet method.

    Welcome to BP, Hassan. You’re definitely not alone on the spreadsheet struggle. I think a lot of landlords eventually realize the actual tasks aren’t that hard, it’s the mental load and staying organized across multiple units that becomes the real challenge. Missing lease renewals, forgetting follow-ups, losing maintenance texts in a sea of messages, scrambling at tax time… that stuff adds up fast. I self-manage too and what helped me most was creating systems and boundaries more than anything else. Automated reminders, separate business banking, dedicated maintenance workflows, and keeping all lease docs in one place made a huge difference. One thing I learned the hard way was that tenants will default to texting for everything unless you train them otherwise from day one. I still use spreadsheets for tracking some higher-level numbers, but not for day-to-day management anymore. A lot of the bigger software platforms felt overbuilt for smaller portfolios, so I get why you built your own solution. Honestly sounds like you identified a real pain point a lot of smaller landlords deal with.
    [email protected]614-300-7535
    Jimmy Lieu, Red 1 Realty4.9124 Reviews
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  • Jon Westrom
    Property Manager · Fort Worth, TX · Member since 2014 · 77 posts · 30 votes
    4mo

    What you're describing — approving every maintenance request, chasing updates, answering forwarded tenant questions — that's not property management, that's just paying for a middleman. After 30 years managing Class A homes in Fort Worth, I've never once called an owner to say "what should I do here?" — that's what they hired us for. The math only works if your time is worth nothing... and most successful investors' time is worth quite a bit. A good PM should make you feel like you own real estate, not like you have a second job.

    1Reply
  • Rachid AbadliBusiness Member
    Investor · Sacramento, CA · Member since 2024 · 129 posts · 37 votes
    4mo

    This is exactly right—the labor isn't what gets you. It's the things that slip through the cracks: missed lease renewals, late notices, forgotten maintenance requests that become habitability complaints.

    I self-manage in California, and the turning point for me was treating it like a system instead of a to-do list. Three things made the biggest difference:

    1. One place for everything. Rent, leases, maintenance, and compliance. If it's split across Venmo, Google Docs, texts, and email, something will get missed. It doesn't matter what tool you use, but it has to be one system.
    2. Automate the calendar stuff. Lease expirations, rent increase windows, and inspection schedules are predictable. They should notify you—not the other way around.
    3. Compliance tracking if you're in a regulated state. I'm in California, so rent cap calculations, notice requirements, and deposit timelines are all landmines. Having something that flags, "This unit is eligible for a 7.9% increase on X date," instead of doing the math manually saved me from a mistake that would have cost more than the property manager ever did.

    The $7,200/year you saved is real money. The key is making sure a $500 compliance mistake doesn't eat into it.

    LeaseBase.ai
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  • Jon Westrom
    Property Manager · Fort Worth, TX · Member since 2014 · 77 posts · 30 votes
    3mo

    Self-managing 5 local units is absolutely doable... I've seen owners pull it off well. Where it usually breaks down is around year two or three, when a problem hits that requires vendor relationships, legal knowledge, or just being there — and they're not. The $600/month fee comparison only tells part of the story. A good PM should be catching things you'd never see from a distance, vetting contractors so you're not overpaying by 30%, and keeping your liability exposure tight. If you're still doing half the work with your PM, that's not a PM fee problem — that's a PM quality problem. Fire that one, sure... but don't confuse a bad PM with the model itself.

    0Reply
  • Jon Westrom
    Property Manager · Fort Worth, TX · Member since 2014 · 77 posts · 30 votes
    3mo

    Self-managing 5 units is absolutely doable, and it sounds like you've got the right instincts. Where it tends to break down for most people isn't the day-to-day tasks... it's when a lease expires and nobody caught it, or a vendor sends an inflated invoice and there's no one to push back. After 30 years managing 450+ homes in Fort Worth, what I've seen is this: the best self-managers treat it like a business with documented systems, not just a to-do list. The tool question is real — Appfolio and Propertyware are built for professional managers but overkill for a handful of units... Stessa or a tight spreadsheet with calendar reminders can work if you stay disciplined. The moment it starts feeling like a second job is usually the sign the math on professional management is worth revisiting.

    0Reply
  • Jon Westrom
    Property Manager · Fort Worth, TX · Member since 2014 · 77 posts · 30 votes
    3mo

    You didn't fire property management... you fired a bad property manager. Huge difference. The forwarding calls and owner approvals you described? That's a systems problem, not an industry problem. I've been managing Class A homes in Fort Worth for over 30 years, and our owners hear from us exactly once a month: a statement and their check. The right PM should be invisible to you.

    0Reply
  • Giuseppe Cavucci
    online · Member since 2026 · 99 posts · 45 votes
    3mo

    The organization point really resonates. I'd add one thing that's easy to miss when you're focused on day to day stuff like rent and maintenance requests: budgeting ahead for the big ticket replacements. Roof, HVAC, water heater, those don't show up as a monthly expense until the day they suddenly do, and that's when a lot of self-managing landlords get caught off guard even if their rent collection and lease tracking are dialed in.

    Do you track expected replacement timelines for your major systems across the 5 units, or is that something you handle more reactively when it comes up?

    0Reply
  • Jon Westrom
    Property Manager · Fort Worth, TX · Member since 2014 · 77 posts · 30 votes
    3mo

    Congrats on making the switch work at 5 units — the organization piece really is the hardest part. What the $7,200 number usually misses is the liability exposure when a lease doesn't comply with state law, and you don't find that out until you're already in court. I've managed 450 Class A homes in Fort Worth for 30 years, and the other cost most DIY landlords don't see coming is contractor pricing — vendors charge solo landlords differently than they price an established PM with volume. Nothing wrong with self-managing at this scale... just know the tipping point usually sneaks up on you, often right around when life at work gets the most interesting. Good luck with the tools search — sounds like you've got the right mindset for it.

    0Reply
  • Alim Polat
    Member since 2026 · 5 posts · 0 votes
    1mo

    Sasha, when you get the bookkeeper for the tax side, what are you expecting to pay a month, and is it the categorising or the matching of deposits to what Rentec shows that you most want off your plate? If the matching alone came back done each month, checked against the bank statement, would that be worth something at your size, or not? I am weighing whether to offer it. A no is a useful answer.

    0Reply
  • Kim Gray
    Member since 2026 · 77 posts · 26 votes
    1mo

    The organization point is the part I relate to. I've self-managed for years while also working full time, and the individual tasks were rarely the problem. It was having enough structure that I didn't have to keep every rent payment, repair, expense and deadline in my head.

    I also think there's a middle ground that gets overlooked. The choice isn't always spreadsheet or full property management. A small landlord can keep control of the decisions while putting systems around the repetitive parts.

    For me, that's the difference between owning rentals and having the rentals own your time.

    0Reply
  • Rachid AbadliBusiness Member
    Investor · Sacramento, CA · Member since 2024 · 129 posts · 37 votes
    1mo

    @Hassan — this resonated. I was in the same spot — paying 10% while still fielding tenant texts and approving every repair. The PM was basically a middleman forwarding me questions I could answer faster myself.

    @John Morgan — 33 properties self-managed is impressive. The "I don't want them to ever leave" philosophy is underrated. Tenant retention is the highest-ROI activity in this business, and most PMs have zero incentive to optimize for it.

    The thing that surprised me wasn't the time — it was the compliance risk. In California, you've got AB 1482 rent caps that vary by city, AB 2801 security deposit photo requirements with a hard 21-day deadline, and local ordinances layered on top. My PM wasn't tracking any of it. I almost missed a deposit return window because nobody had a system for it.

    That's what pushed me to systematize everything — not the rent collection (that's easy), but the deadlines and jurisdiction-specific rules that can actually cost you money or land you in court. I ended up building a tool for it because nothing on the market tracked compliance at the unit level.

    @Bianca Barcelos — for the if/then automation you're describing (reminders that extend with lease renewals), look for anything that lets you set triggers off lease dates rather than static calendar reminders. Static reminders break the second a tenant renews early or you adjust terms.

    LeaseBase.ai
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  • Igor Ganapolsky
    Coral Springs, FL · Member since 2018 · 497 posts · 118 votes
    1mo

    honestly the math that changed my mind wasn't the 10% it was what i was doing during the hours i spent "overseeing" the pm. i was still fielding tenant calls, approving repairs, chasing updates. paying someone to be a middleman between me and my own phones. once i realized the fee wasn't buying me time back, just buying me the illusion of not being involved, i dropped them too. the real unlock for me wasn't any particular software though. it was accepting that self-managing means you're the business, not the owner of the business. once i stopped fighting that and just built simple systems around it (one spreadsheet, one handyman on speed dial, rent due on the 1st no exceptions), the whole thing got way easier. good on you for building your own tool. most people i know just use a spreadsheet and a prayer lol

    0Reply
  • Assaf Ma
    San Diego, CA · Member since 2026 · 17 posts · 4 votes
    1mo

    I'm wondering how are you managing finding new tenants remotely?

    0Reply
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