Property Management Software Features List | 2023 Guide

Modern property management encompasses tasks of diverse nature like online marketing, leasing, accounting, compliance and payment processing that can be highly taxing without proper assistance. Property management software is essential in providing a single source of information for your team and smoothly managing properties. But are you hesitant to pick a platform? Not sure which property management software features best suit your business? Don’t worry. We’ve got you covered.

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Itinerary:

What Is Property Management Software?

Property management software or PM software is a platform offering a bundle of tools that can:

• Market properties on multiple channels.
• Offer a centralized view of bookings and appointments.
• Design and generate leases for eSigning.
• Manage prospect, guest and tenant communications.
• Track maintenance and housekeeping.
• Record financials and automate bookkeeping.
• Create dashboards and visualizations for daily reporting.

The platform brings every aspect of real estate under one roof, maintains a clean audit trail and automates administrative tasks, leaving room for you to focus on customer experience, KPI analysis and business growth.

Who Needs It?

Anyone responsible for managing rental real estate’s day-to-day activities and profitability can benefit from implementing property management systems. Some of the sectors that see the maximum benefit from using the platform are:

• Residentials: Market, manage and maintain residential properties with rental PMS. You can accept online rents and maintain clear lines of communication for a better tenant experience.
• Commercials: You can manage properties like shopping malls, office spaces, airports, marketplaces and other retail spaces. Commercial management software offers CAM reconciliation, utility tracking and robust reporting tools to handle complex commercial leases.
• Hotel: Create websites and accept direct bookings with hotel management software. The system can handle front desk activities and connect with backend workflows for smooth data flow and improved visibility. You can manage motels, hotel chains, bed and breakfast, vacation rentals, and every other hospitality real estate.
• Homeowner’s Association: HOA software offers specialized modules for managing association meetings, polls and community notices on top of the usual features of property management software.
• Public Housing: Access robust accounting tools for handling government funds and benefits. You can rent, manage and communicate from anywhere with a mobile device.
• Student Housing: Track individual beds on a timely basis and rent each student for amenities used. Students get individual portals to pay, request services and chat with managers.
• Self-storage: You get color-coded maps to track each space’s status. Connect with gate systems, CCTV cameras and thermostats to track tenant movement within facilities.
• Real-estate Investors: Investors can track the profitability and growth of different asset classes from a unified dashboard.

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How Does It Work

Due to the broad scope of property management software, most modules have specialized functionalities catering to a specific real estate section. But overall, every PM system is responsible for handling five pillars of property management:

Marketing

You can distribute your unit’s availability, pricing and other information on multiple listing channels, distribution services and travel agencies. Get a centralized view of every application and define custom rules for accepting and rejecting offers.

For residential and commercial properties, you can screen prospects and applicants for credit score, criminal history, background, business health and other metrics. Once you’ve found the ideal tenant, you can move on to the next step.

Booking/Leasing

Quickly design leases using state-specific templates and enable prospects to eSign documents using any device. The software maintains the lease library and sends alerts about important upcoming events like renewals, inspections and terminations.

Hotel managers get a native reservation engine to take direct bookings and avoid third-party commissions and fees. Once they accept a booking, the front desk staff receives notifications to block rooms and schedule housekeeping.

Online Rent

The platform can accept credit cards, ACH transfers and digital wallets. You can set up rent reminders and define rules to charge late payment penalties.

Depending on the software, you might get a native payment processor that connects to your bank accounts or integrates with popular payment gateways like PayPal, Stripe, RazorPay and more.

Maintenance

Mobile apps or portals help tenants submit maintenance tickets with multimedia proof. You can respond to each ticket from a unified inbox, issue work orders to external vendors and track progress.

Reporting

Property management software is a hub of your operational data, allowing you to create reports and visualizations. You can export the reports in various formats like .xlxs, PDF, and .doc and distribute them to owners, staff and other concerned parties.

Advanced platforms also offer owner portals, and you can manage each owner’s access levels.

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Key Features

1. Accounting

Trust accounting is unavoidable in property management. You must maintain separate accounts for deposits and operational funds, disburse owners and suppliers, send statements, maintain ledgers, and manage compliance with state laws. A small mistake in these tasks can land you in hot water. Plus, with the new lease accounting standard update, property management accounting couldn’t be more complicated.

One of the main features is automating a major chunk of accounting activities. Most platforms are trust accounting-certified and can maintain separate accounts and ledgers for properties, owners and tenants. Account for leases according to the latest FASB and IFRS standards and quickly submit 1099 MISC tax forms. You can also create public disclosure forms, budgets, bulk charges, payroll structures, automated invoices and more.

• 1099 eFiling
• Accounts payable and receivable
• ACH payments
• Bank reconciliation
• Budget management
• Bulk tenant charges
• CAM tracking
• Credit card payments
• Fee management
• Fixed assets
• General ledger
• Holding deposit
• Invoicing
• Lease accounting
• Recurring charges
• Payroll management
• Debt Collection

2. Operational Tools

Property management systems make the daily lives of managers easier. Integrated calendars allow you to post activities, notify team members and track progress. You also receive a templates library for quickly designing emails and letters.

Advanced solutions like AppFolio and Propertyware offer call center services for receiving tenant queries and maintenance requests 24/7. You can manage the activities of multiple properties from a single dashboard. A few systems also provide compliance management modules that notify you of upcoming important dates and things you need to do.

• Compliance management
• Contact center
• Letter templates
• Owner portal
• Multi-location management
• Interactive calendars
• Task tracking

3. Reporting and Analytics

The depth of the reporting module varies from platform to platform. Costlier solutions have robust reporting and analytics modules that help you track KPIs, determine trends, and identify growth opportunities. You can also analyze competitor rent structures to determine the ideal pricing for your unit.

Most economical options have basic reporting libraries with templates for profitability, vacancy, operations and more. Customize these templates to fit your needs and schedule statements for automated reporting in intervals.

• Custom dashboards
• Customizable reports
• Report exporting
• Pre-defined templates
• Automation and scheduling
• Cost analysis
• Market rent analysis
• Owner statements
• Marketing intelligence

4. Leasing

This property management software feature can turn leasing into a walk in the park. You get a library of templates compliant with all the latest standards, enabling you to generate new leases with a few clicks. The system creates a repository of all your leasing data and sends alerts to keep you on top of upcoming renewals and terminations.

Tenants can use individual portals to access leases and request terminations or renewals. You can also include specialized clauses in your lease and automatically track violations and charge penalties.

Other than leasing, you can also screen applicants’ credit scores by connecting with TransUnion. Screen prospects based on personalized metrics and club screening costs with application fees. Enterprise platforms also provide tools to manage renter’s insurance and security deposits.

• Applicant credit scoring
• Tenant screening
• Lead and applicant tracking
• Lease agreement drafting
• Lease renewal
• Rent by-the-bed
• Insurance management
• Tenant and lease database
• Tenant or resident portal
• Billing and transaction history tracking
• Violations tracking

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