Come for the website capabilities, stay for the value

Pros

I switched to this software from another, $10/month cheaper software. Rentec's software is really easy to use. You don't need accounting or business knowledge to operate this software. It is really easy to use. I switched to Rentec so I could have my listings automatically populate on my website (tired of manually entering them on website by Wix). Tenants can also apply electronically from website, and log in to view their tenant or owners portal. The features for the tenants are quite nice, and make my company look professional and modern. The accounting features are great, and paying property owners is a breeze. I had little accounting knowledge when I migrated to this property, and everything makes sense. The auto syndication features are amazing, straight to Zillow and its affiliates overnight.

Cons

I have to be honest, I'm complaining about a free feature, but my least favorite part of the software is the website in which I migrated to Rentec for. If I try to edit my website and add items that are not on the template, my website has major HTML coding issues and will not publish properly. The visual appearance of my website thru Rentec is subpar considering what I had before. That said, I could not get the functionality I needed from my old website, and I will sacrifice appearance for functionality. I actually learned HTML coding so I could add a contact us field on my website, but I couldn't save the website with HTML coding.

Another item I dislike, although it's more a feature I don't use as opposed to an issue with Rentec, is there are so many redundancies when it comes to the tenant. I plug in their email and name, and that should be all for my purposes. But I have to manually go in and authorize them to receive emails from me. And then authorize them access to the tenants portal. And authorize them to make partial payments, and so on.

Great value

Overall, this is a really great program. Cost is low, customer service is responsive, and there are a lot of capabilities. So far, it seems they continue to add new features and improve, which is a great sign for future growth. I would definitely recommend them, and I'm happy so far.

Pros

Easy to set up and pretty easy to use. Most likely, the confusion sometimes has more to do with my accounting abilities than the software itself. Customer service is very quick to respond, which is great, although not the friendliest. They seem to work to continue improving, which is important. They recently added a co-renter option for portal access, which is fantastic, and I'm so happy they added that. We have only had the service a month or two, but so far, we are pleased.

Cons

Like I said, customer service is responsive and quick, but not the friendliest, but they get the job done & that's most important. I feel like there are some functionalities that I feel would be pretty standard, yet Rentec doesn't have the feature. For instance, you have to do a work around for multiple property owners, but it doesn't really help much. Reporting functionality is lacking. There are a good bit of reports, but some that should be standard are not available. I also do not like the way ACH is reported, because you have to do a little digging to find out if payments went through or just trust it's working. However, technology, as we know, does not always work properly, and I hate to just leave it to chance. Although, this is probably more of an issue with Forte, who processes the payments, than Rentec. However, Rentec did partner with this company, so it's basically lumped in together.

Perfect for beginers

I would recommend this to anyone with less than 100 properties.

Pros

We used this product for a few years when our property management company was just starting to grow. It was great in the beginning because it got everything out of excel and quick books and onto a property-oriented platform. The reports were excellent. The program was extremely user-friendly.

Cons

We ended up changing to another program when we grew out of Rentec Direct. The program only allowed you to deposit ACH payments into one account and that was an issue for us.

I love their customer support!

I've been a client of Rentec for almost 4 years and what stands out about them to me is their extremely helpful customer support. Special kudos to both Kathryn and Kevin who have helped me accomplish everything I need using their software. Whether I call or email, it seems like I get answers right away. Aside from the software being super easy to learn, I've really enjoyed all the features they've added over the years. It seems like every time I login there's something being improved.

Pros

The software is easy to learn for both me and my assistant. We were able to get up and running using the software in days, and that included bringing in all our data. The staff at Rentec was also tremendously helpful in getting it all imported.

Cons

The video training material is a bit dated, but still useful.

An outstanding management tool!

I was on RentPost previously. From that experience, I learned the hard way that while a website may make boasts of great software, if there is no Customer Support or strong Development group behind it, the user experience can be time-consuming and difficult. Converting to Rentec Direct allowed me to free up a lot of time that I formerly spent trying to fix issues caused by the software. I am so pleased with the quality of Rentec's Customer Support and Development teams.

Pros

1. Customer Support is excellent. There is great help on the Chat window and when that isn't available, phone support is great.

2. Easy to use. Once I got familiar with the system, it became a slam-dunk to manage monthly rent collection and on-time lease renewals. Training was great so I got up to speed quickly.

3. Tenants like it. Ease of use applies to tenants also. Rent reminders and late notices are clear and tenants have no problem working with the system. Rentec takes that burden off my desk. And tenants love the ACH and credit card options.

4. Software works as advertised. The Development team has built a solid product.

Cons

It would be nice to have a reporting tool that allowed me to create my own reports. Owner reporting is not very elegant as it is today.

Simple and Easy

If it wasn't so much work and if payments from tenants processed quicker, I would switch back. I preferred the ease and simplicity of Rentec over AppFolio which I am using now.

Pros

Very user friendly
No learning curve
Reports are easy to read
Information is formatted in a way that most would understand
Price is great and this is good for those with only a couple rentals or if you have 100's

Cons

When I used this product, it didn't offer all the bells and whistles that others did like an app for your phone
The ACH process was too slow when I used it and it could take too many days to get money and send money

Easy and Integrated Property Management

I mentioned a few specific items on my "wish list" and customer service was able to explain options to accomplish them on the first call. That saves a lot of frustration and wasted customization time. Small and limited staff companies will love the financial and management integration that saves time and money.

Pros

I had a list of items applicable to my specific circumstances, of course. I used this to compare software, so that I knew these would be accommodated, then on to the functionality. Like many of us, I didn't want a difficult system for my clerical help. At the same time, the integrated accounting and background/credit checks were good matches for our needs and money-saving, to boot.

Cons

The setup for properties and their perimeters takes some time, but all systems require it. The first, general setup did give us an opportunity to look at our policies and procedures overall, which is important to do, especially when switching to a new system.

Awesome help

Pros

This software is very easy to use, and it offers all that I need to make managing our properties easy. The customer service and tech support is amazing. The support team has been very helpful several times in guiding me through some of the technical aspects of the software that have made things run more efficiently for our daily flow. I felt very capable of using this software after having the training provided over the phone.

Cons

There are a couple of things that I would like to see Rentec Direct offer in the future. However, I love how it has a suggestion area which lets me know that some improvements or upgrades are in the works or are being considered.

Great program! Needs some work but all in all a great program!

Some of the things that need work are: Docusign - it needs to be where we can assign signature fields for the tenant so they know where to sign. Reconciling - It needs to be a little less confusing when reconciling the ACH transactions. it would also be better if you could sort out the transactions by check number/ACH or by date. Scrolling - when you go into a tenants account to make changes the page scrolls back to the top when you come out. It needs to stay where you went into the tenants account so that if you are making multiple changes in an account you dont have to search for it again when you make the first change. Owner disbursements - It would be great if the program would automatically send an email to the owners when an owner disbursement is made.

Pros

It makes life a lot easier in the rental managing world. This program helps keep up with tenant payments and owner disbursements.

Blows our old platform away !

Overall positive, still needs a little tweaking.

Pros

Built in marketing tools (website).
Right-priced screening tools.
Accounting features.

Cons

1. Asking someone to "Apply now" (from just the pictures) is a bit intimidating for many prospective tenants. There should be button for "request more information, and maybe "for a faster response answer these questions". Basically looking to have them fill out a brief questionnaire before actually applying with social security numbers, kids names, etc. So for now I'm using the "apply now" button as a questionnaire, and still have tenants completing paper (full) applications (after viewing property). Would love to be able to do BOTH online.
2. It was not immediately clear that we needed to set a fee for credit cards. In our first month a bunch of tenants saw no fee for the credit card, so we got charged a bunch of fees we did not intend to pay!
3. In addition to rentals, we do some fix/flips and some fix to hold. It would be awesome if there was a way to track ONLY capital expenses for a property

Rentec Direct is very user friendly and support is always available and excellent!

I would have and HAVE recommended RenTec Direct to other Property Management Companies.

Pros

RenTec Direct Software is extremely user-friendly and so easy to use. I am not very computer literate and I was able to teach myself the program. When I have a problem or question or something out of the ordinary comes up I just call support team and is there so helpful, friendly and personable. That definitely helps when your stressed and need help with your software!

Cons

There are a few things that I would change regarding some of the reports, however, they have been adding and changing things daily so I do not really have many cons.

We have outgrown Rentec

We have been using Rentec for over 5 years. We have over 600 units on Rentec, both multifamily and retail. We started out as a small company and now have about 30 employees. I was a huge, avid fan of this software when we were smaller, but the lack of controls as we have grown larger now outweigh the positives. There is a very limited amount of control for user access. Basically a user has access to everything or read only access. It is very difficult to control process and data integrity throughout a larger organization. If you are a smaller company starting out, this software is fantastic. If you have more than 5 or 6 people in your data, you can't control the data quality because everyone has access to everything. No way to lock anything down, or create user levels of access. I have been asking Rentec for this change for over 2 years. We are now shopping for different software.

Pros

Great functionality for smaller companies and number of rental units (4 or fewer employees)
Easy to use to get the basics started

Cons

If you plan on growing past 5 employees, consider something else. Not enough controls for various employee access/restriction to appropriate data/pages. Customer service used to be great, has slowed considerably in the last 2 years. The company has gotten a lot larger, and thus don't listen as well as they used to. Make sure that the software meets your current (and future) needs. Don't expect major changes. Small rollouts of capabilities do continue to happen.

Simple, Organized Layout

This site has been great for all of my needs, from keeping track of tenants, landlords, properties, and maintenance. Sometimes running reports is a little labor-intensive, as you can't print out monthly reports, etc. that we use for all properties at once, so it takes time to select each property and run reports individually. Overall though, this is user-friendly and great for our needs.

Pros

Easy to use, organized and simple design

Cons

Running some reports can be laborious since you can't run some categories for all properties at one time, as we need to do each month.

This company is amazing

I have used them for 9 years. I would recommend them to anyone.

Pros

The software is easy to learn, use. The people are very nice. Very good for the money. They have thought of everything.

Cons

Online payment could be easier to use. The app for the phone should be for managers as well. Pay checks should be easier to do.

Rentech mostly behaves the way you would expect the software to behave and is functional.

Ease of use and I went through my first accounting review with the results

Pros

It was relatively easy to learn and behave the way you expected it to. It was easy to find the controls for changing what little you could change in the functionality.
The reports are what you expect them to be, income/expense, income, expense.
The rent-roll was reasonable.
Everything is exportable.
The bank accounts acted like bank accounts and were thus easy to understand.
Entering the data didn't take an excessive number of steps

Cons

Going from one screen to another sometimes took an excessive amount of time. Some archiving of data locally to the users browser would probably enhance the user experience significantly.
Use of an input worksheet for income and expenses would make these tasks much more effective and efficient.

Terrific software, outstanding customer service!

Pros

I had done an obscene amount of research on software options for my small landlord operation (18 units so far) since I was outgrowing the excel spreadsheets that had at one point kept me somewhat organized. Honestly, I thought my mind was made up on Buildium, but once I did an overview with Kathryn over the phone, I was hooked. I told her exactly what I wanted from the software and where my trouble spots were with my current "system", and she walked me through the very features that Rentec Direct would provide.

I got a free 30 day trial to play around with the system and within a week, I had made my decision. I also looked at Simplifyem along with Buildium and Rentec won hands down for the features and the price. Since then, I have had a million questions, and all of them were answered within minutes either through email or over the phone (I am kind of a Luddite and need a lot of hand-holding...) Thank the heavens for Kathryn-- the most patient person in the world. The customer service is beyond phenomenal, people.

Cons

I wish that when filing out a work order, it could be an SMS notification, rather than just an email.

I Love Rentec Direct.

I am not a computer savvy person and I found Rentec to be super user friendly!

Pros

I like the customer service and how they can remote into my computer. I am a visual person and being able to be talked through what I need to do while doing it is extremely helpful!

Cons

There are a few things that could be changed with the software but they aren't major issues. Just things that would be more helpful to me while creating certain reports.

Rep has been a great help

Rep has been over the top helpful I have call several times trying to set up a Merchant account and each time I talked to her, she has patiently walked me through it, even when I have been annoyingly slow to understand.

Pros

Great customer service and easy to use. Plus many services at a cost effective price. Very good reports

Cons

Not easy to call. Have to wait for call back, not always convenient. I would also like more freedom to be able to custmize reports

Full Service rental software A++++

Pros

I love how easy the product is to use and the support you get when you have a question. The software has helped our business grow so much and get our apartment listings in front of people we never would of normally see our local ads. It has great accounting functionality built into it that allows us to reconcile with our bank accounts in a very easy and effective way.

Cons

I do not have any complaints at this time when we first started using it 5 years ago there were a few things but they have been updating and adding features all the time and now there are no missing features or problems that are unresolved.