“The global property management software market size was valued at USD 1.58 billion in 2019 and is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 5.2% from 2020 to 2027.” – Grand View Research, Property Management Software Market Size

Real estate is evolving. And technology – or to be more specific – top property management software is the driving force behind the evolution.

Fortunately for all of you real estate market players, this post is here to help you get clued up on all things tech, so you can stock your property management digital toolkit.

To find out about top property management software and to understand how it can help you mitigate human error, enhance communication, save time, and automate recurring tasks – keep on scrolling.

Or alternatively, to skip to a specific section, click the links below:

• An introduction to property management software
• How can top property management software streamline your processes
• Top property management software
• Useful real estate tools
• Further resources for your real estate toolbox

Let’s get started!
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The Angel Group encompasses several companies that revolve around property buying, property renovation, and property letting. 

Joanne Dron, Director and Owner of The Angel Group, talks to us about how Process Street has revolutionized the way they manage new properties, and shares a few tips on how to revamp your other processes and even onboard employees 24x faster.

• Benefits The Angel Group saw with Process Street
• Property management process tips

Homeowner associations (HOAs), also commonly referred to as community associations or residents associations, are on the rise in the US.

A 2019 study found that nearly 60% of recently built single-family houses, and 80% of houses in new subdivisions, are part of an HOA.

If we were to break that down by region, HOAs govern about 33% of homes in the Northeast, about 50% of homes in the Midwest, and at least 75% of homes in the West and the South.

All in all, there are now almost 310,000 HOA-governed communities in the United States, which is a staggering 260% growth since their inception in the 1970s.

Needless to say, it’s likely that you will encounter an HOA property while house-hunting, and if you are on the other side (an HOA community member) it’s important that you and the other members manage the association well to keep the community happy and attract new residents who could easily choose an alternative.

This post aims to provide you with the tools you need to manage an HOA that stands out and establish a community that not only feels confident in the leadership team, but also provides the space for members to contribute in a way that benefits the collective.

We will be covering:

• What is Homeowner’s Association Management?
• Process Street Checklists: Optimizing HOA Management
• HOA Audit Checklist
• HOA Budget Preparation Checklist
• HOA Property Maintenance Checklist
• HOA Home Cleaning Checklist
• HOA Newsletter Template
• HOA Board Meeting Agenda Template
• HOA Annual Board Organization Checklist
• HOA Transition Checklist
• Enhance Productivity and Collaboration with our Approvals Feature
• Other Useful Resources for HOA and Property Management

Here is a preview of the free homeowner’s association management checklists that we’re offering in this post:

Let’s get started!
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This is a guest post by Thornie Longmuir from EssayShark, an on-line academic writing service. Thornie Longmuir is an experienced marketing expert with a deep knowledge of SEO, and over 10 years of experience working within the IT industry. Through his articles, Thornie helps SMEs and entrepreneurs launch their online products or services and teaches them how to promote and sell them. His articles are mainly focused on new and upcoming marketing tools and techniques.

Real estate agents have it tough.

They often work long, anti-social hours, they spend hours driving to and from different locations, they face a lot of rejection, and it can take a long time to become successful.

Virtual Reality (VR) is a new type of technology that can solve these issues.

How?

Let’s find out together by exploring the following topics in this Process Street post:

• What is virtual reality?
• Where did virtual reality come from?
• Virtual reality in real estate
• The benefits of virtual reality real estate

Ready to find out what impact VR is having on the real estate market today?

Let’s go!

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This is our third template pack composed of checklists that are designed to be worked through in conjunction with a specific property management tool.

We did a pack for Appfolio, Propertyware, and now here are 5 checklist templates for property managers out there who use Buildium to help them run their business.

Buildium is a powerful tool that addresses all aspects of property management.

The platform has built a stellar reputation largely due to its ability to facilitate the tenant-rental owner relationship by offering customizable rental applications, tenant screening, lease tracking, automated rent collection, and other handy features including a full general ledger for accounting.

It’s truly an end-to-end solution for property management firms of all sizes.

The software is entirely cloud-based, so requires no additional hardware or software installations and can be accessed from anywhere.

The platform is currently used by over 12,000 property managers and 175,000 property owners; numbers that will surely continue to rise as they gain popularity and look to bring in more enterprise-level customers.

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We recently released 5 checklist templates designed specifically to help Appfolio users manage a handful of core property management workflows more effectively.

The following templates are a continuation of our effort to support property managers who are already using a software tool to manage their processes.

This time we’ve customized the templates for Propertyware users, and in the following weeks, we will release another set of templates designed for property managers who use Buildium.

Propertyware, a subsidiary of RealPage, is a cloud-based, end-to-end property management platform that helps you manage the entire renter life-cycle, from online payment processing to customer portals and work order management tools.

Based in San Francisco, California, Propertyware is one of the oldest full-service property management platforms out there, and has built a loyal customer base of over 2,000 companies.

If you are one of those companies, we hope you will find these checklists useful and integrate them to improve productivity and overall business performance.

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Lease renewals are a core workflow in property management that need to be executed with care and professionalism to get the desired outcome.

As is the case with property management in general, the lease renewal process depends on a series of decisions made by the property manager, property owner, and the tenant which can be unpredictable and demands adaptability on the part of the property manager to avoid delays, frustration, and unnecessary costs.

The dependency on decisions made by owners and tenants means that it is absolutely critical to stay ahead of the game and maintain a consistent flow of communication with both the owner and the tenant to ensure they are comfortable with moving forward, whether that be renewing the lease or vacating the property.

In this post, I’m going to run through the lease renewal process, break down what it involves, explain how a smooth process benefits your property management firm, provide some tips for handling key components like raising rent, negotiating, and evaluating the suitability of month-to-month leases.

Finally, I’ll go through how simple workflow software can streamline the whole process and help you avoid facing challenges that stifle growth, namely having to constantly find, screen and onboard new tenants. Though this is sometimes unavoidable, a formal, documented process that is followed by your team and tracked by managers puts you in the best position to manage the lease renewal process as effectively as possible.

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There is a need for digital transformation in property management

There is no easy way to summarize the role of a property manager in a way that really captures the wide range of responsibilities they have.

In essence, it’s all about communication. Interactions with property owners, tenants, and employees all need to be coordinated with efficiency and professionalism in order to keep all parties satisfied, establish a loyal customer base and enable future growth in a tough market.

Basically, managing properties isn’t just about real estate — it’s just as much about relationships.

You have to track conversations and deal statuses across multiple landlords, tenants, and applicants in addition to managing the properties themselves. It’s high-touch, high-urgency, and high-stress work.

“Communication can easily become chaos if not handled correctly. Between phone calls, text messages, emails, and walk-in traffic, it can be hard to keep tenants, owners, and staff on the same page. Documentation is very important to avoid miscommunication.” – Nick D’Agnillo, CEO & Founder of Nexus Property Management

The extent of human interaction that is integral to property management creates a large margin for human error. Poor lead management, documentation of calls/emails, inspection coordination, tenant screening, and maintenance work orders are just a few examples of tasks/processes that are difficult to execute consistently without the assistance of workflow software running in the background.

As a result, property management firms are beginning to place a greater focus on improving business efficiency by formally documenting their processes and integrating workflow software, because it enables them to deliver their clients a superior service, while also providing employees with the tools they need to perform at their best.

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Firstly, I should clarify that these are not checklists created by Appfolio, as the title may suggest. They are, rather, checklists created by the team here at Process Street (with some help from customers) that are designed to be used by property management firms who use Appfolio.

Appfolio is one of the most popular property management software tools currently on offer, enabling more efficient management of all kinds of properties including apartments, residences, and commercial real estate.

It is an all-in-one solution that includes features such as online owner and renter portals, online applications and leases, online payments, built-in screening, maintenance requests, mobile inspections, bulk text messaging, accounting, reporting, and a mobile app.

The software’s rich feature set, intuitive UI, and automation capabilities have received excellent feedback from its users, making it a popular choice amongst property management firms of all sizes, particularly those that are growing at a fast rate and are looking for a tool that will enable them to scale while minimizing growing pains.

To help you get the most out of Process Street while using Appfolio, we’ve created a set of 5 templates to bring the two applications closer together as, currently, Appfolio does not integrate with Zapier.

We chose to create the following checklists because they are core workflows in the field of property management, and are common uses cases amongst a number of our customers that use Appfolio on a daily basis.

If you want to dive in and go straight to the checklists, there are quick links right below. Otherwise, scroll down for a brief intro to each one.

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Alarca Realty is a property management firm based in Charlotte, North Carolina, specializing in the full-service management of family homes, condominiums, townhouses, duplexes, and small multi-family developments.

We spoke with owner and CEO Bob Abbott to discuss how Alarca uses Process Street to improve the management and execution of property management workflows that keep their growing business running smoothly.

Streamline property management yourself with Process Street

Before we jump into Alarca’s story, check out the webinar video below. It’s a great resource for learning about how you can use Process Street to bolster your property management-related workflows, just like Alarca!

The Alarca Story

Founded in 2005, Alarca began with the mission of delivering world-class property management services in Charlotte and other locations in southwestern North Carolina.

Their focus on customer service and providing the highest return for clients has resulted in them achieving industry-leading client retention levels.

For many years, the company used a large library of spreadsheets to manage internal processes and track communication with clients.

As the company grew, so did their spreadsheets, and it soon became incredibly difficult and time-consuming to execute tasks as efficiently as they would like.

Bob identified this bottleneck, and after a period of significant research and testing, decided to go with Process Street to improve the way his team complete their day-to-day tasks and for him, as the manager, to gain greater insight into the progress of workflows.

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