Building an Effective Property Management Tech Stack
As a property manager, there's some truth to the statement that you're only as good as the technology you use.
Technology can make all the difference in your ability to effectively communicate, coordinate maintenance, and offer your tenants a great experience. In light of this fact, you need to build a tech stack that offers you all the convenience of modern innovations.
The right property technology (proptech) works in combination to make your life easier, smooth communication with owners and tenants, and boost your ROI.
Here’s what you need to know to build an effective proptech stack.
An Understanding of Your Needs
For every property manager, a range of diverse but interconnected tasks make up your day-to-day activities. From marketing and promotion to managing financial data, there's a lot on your plate. Luckily, software can help.
However, an imprecise approach to integrating technology into your workflow can end up giving you more headaches. That's why it's essential to start by defining and listing your needs.
A proptech stack allows you to complete core business functions while reducing the time you spend on tedious tasks, in turn leaving you open to focus on valuable human relationships.
Likely, there are tasks that come to mind right now that you wish were simpler or faster. Here are just some of the property management areas what technology can help:
Accounting
Rent collection
Communication
Scalability
Marketing
From platforms that put all of your rent and financial data into one easy dashboard to mobile applications that allow a tenant to submit a maintenance request from their phone, there are plenty of tools that can help pick up the slack for any of your many duties.
But first, you need to know what technology is out there.
An Awareness of Tech on the Market
Your journey towards building an effective property management tech stack will be guided by your awareness of all the tools available to you. In the modern age, you can get just about any kind of software-as-a-service for a monthly or yearly fee. These costs can be an investment considering the ease and transparency they offer you.
However, narrowing down the sheer breadth of products on the market can be difficult. That's why we’ve broken down property management software into three useful categories:
1. Management Systems
There are plenty of comprehensive software systems that make property management a much simpler task than it's ever been before. With the help of platforms like AppFolio or Yardi Breeze, you can coordinate your property information into comprehensive dashboards and even collect rent online.
From there, you can manage all your vital data over secure cloud networks for greater transparency.
2. Renter Portals
Then, there are tenant-focused services like TenantCloud that specialize not only in rent collection but in accepting rental applications, tenant screening, maintenance requests, and more.
Often, broader property management systems will have a comprehensive renter portal and even a mobile application that makes communication with your renters easy.
3. Marketing and Listing Platforms
Finally, there are the systems designed to make listing and marketing your properties a breeze. Tools like Propertyware or Rentec Direct allow you to automate listings and conveniently coordinate your marketing so that none of your properties go empty for long.
Many of these tools overlap. Nowadays, software companies increasingly offer cohesive packages containing just about anything property managers could want from a cloud-based system. Explore the host of tools available to you and make the best decision for managing your properties.
An Effective Approach to Software Integration
Finally, maintaining an effective proptech stack comes down to how you integrate the tools you choose.
For example, you might want to utilize the features of a property management mobile application for collecting rent. But maybe you prefer to use a social media page like Facebook to coordinate with tenants and provide property news.
The most important thing is that your proptech stack serves your needs without creating additional issues or points of confusion. Ideally you want all your systems to feed into one cohesive source for visualizing your data, communicating with owners, and ensuring smooth resolutions to tenant problems.
Here are some tips for integrating a proptech stack that makes that happen:
If possible, use one software platform.
Explore where you want to customize systems and where out-of-the-box solutions might be best.
Maintain a strategy for collecting data consistently.
Read reviews and speak with other property managers about their experiences with different software platforms.
Keep up on new tech innovations and emerging property management tools.
By following these tips, you can integrate new property management systems that streamline every aspect of your job. While there will always be concerns and drawbacks with every potential option, these tools can make data analysis and communication easy. As a result, you'll have more time to focus on your residents and properties to provide the best possible experiences and build value for your assets.
By understanding your needs, exploring the systems available to you, and integrating these systems effectively, you'll boost your ROI and your reputation as a property manager. If you haven't already, look for ways to improve your process with technology now.
For more information on real estate investment and property management contact 208.properties or find us on social media.