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Cloop’D Advice: Why Should I Use a Property Management App/Platform?
If we dare to say so, property management has gotten better over the years. I believe it is safe to say that technology has aided in making lives easier. And it has proven particularly useful in property management.
Property management apps, letting platforms, and other services are being developed to take the hassle out of finding the perfect place to live or to allow landlords to list their properties without wasting time.
At Clooper, for example, you can sign up to list your properties and, in the not-too-distant future, join our community of tenants looking for their ideal home. We connect these tenants with landlords who have rental properties that meet their requirements. It takes only a few minutes to sign up for an account here.
Property management apps usually allow homeowners and landlords to list, manage and stay in control of their properties from anywhere in the world using their web or mobile devices. Even skilled tradespeople can find on-the-spot maintenance work on some.
To put it simply, a property management app saves time, helps you manage your property better and there’s sustaining it which are the fairly obvious reasons. But there are numerous other reasons to keep up with the times. Tenants may be able to use such web or mobile apps to find rental properties. Landlords may be able to use them to find tenants, and homeowners may be able to use them to find property maintenance services. And this is just us looking into the future and the unending possibilities!
While we are simply stating the obvious reason we currently use a property management platform, listing platform, etc. We have once again shone the spotlight on Toks Adebiyi, our founder – who knows a lot about property management-, in this month’s Cloop’D Advice.
If you missed the first one, you can catch up here.
So, Ted Smy generally asks in this edition, “Why should I use a property management app/platform?“.
Toks Responds:
What is the best way to describe a property management app?
A property management application is a type of software, typically cloud-based, that enables landlords to look after their properties while also enabling better service provision to their tenants.
I always refer to landlords as being in the hospitality business, and the best hospitality businesses understand that how you make the customer feel is everything. As a result, they would typically use the best software that allows them to provide a great service to their guests. The same applies to residential landlords.
Thus, a property management app allows for compliance with local laws, asset management and, most importantly, great service provision to tenants.
Why should anyone (tenant or landlord) use a property management app, in your opinion?
In an industry with no shortage of legislative constraints, it is all too easy to misstep something that could have detrimental financial or customer experience implications.
The majority of landlords in the UK are either part-time or accidental landlords who may be relatively inexperienced in dealing with the quagmire of landlord and tenant laws. So a good and relatively inexpensive property management software would be of great use in keeping track of issues with your property investments
Have you ever used property management or listing platform as a tenant, landlord, or homeowner? How did you find it to be beneficial?
Yes, I have always used property management tools to help me become better at letting and managing properties. I use many features of the property management systems but for me, the reminders are among the most useful. Reminders to sort gas safety certificates, carry out periodic inspections, renew tenancy agreements and so on are invaluable.
The second most useful feature for me is the financial management provided by such tools. Being able to view income and expenses with the click of a button greatly assists me in staying on top of things and ensuring the properties’ sustainability. This feature also helps us with our end-of-period accounting.
How has it aided a tenant looking for an ideal home or a landlord looking to connect with a tenant in your experience?
Personally, I believe that the use of property management systems is beneficial to the housing sector because it allows landlords to run their businesses and provide a much better service to their tenants.
It may not necessarily aid the connection to new tenants but it should improve the relationships with existing tenants.
Is there anything else you’d like to mention?
Property management tools were once considered expensive and were typically used by larger portfolio landlords, while average landlords relied on spreadsheets to manage their businesses.
However, in this day and age of ever-changing and expanding property and tenant laws, and with the costs of such systems falling, making them easily accessible to almost everyone. I believe even small landlords should consider whether getting a property management system to assist in running and growing their property portfolio is a good decision.
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Cloop’D Advice is a monthly recurring segment in which our founder, Toks Adebiyi, answers questions about property management, ownership, tenancy, regulations, and everything else in between.
About Toks
Toks Adebiyi is Clooper’s founder and CEO. With over ten (10) years of consulting experience leading and delivering digital transformations (including FTSE 100) for brands like VISA and G-Research.
He began his real estate career as the previous owner of a property club with over a thousand landlord members with over fifteen (15) years of experience in property investment and management.
Toks Adebiyi has a BSc in Business Management and Information Technology with 1st class honours. He also has a Harvard Business School Certificate in Real Estate Management as well as an NFoPP Level 3 Technical Award in Residential Property Management and Commercial Property Agency. Among others.
His firm has provided consulting services to a variety of brands, including Prudential, Visa Europe, G-Research, LexisNexis, Lloyds Register, Regus, and the European Medicines Agency.
Toks is a Paul Harris Fellow and a Rotarian. He likes to travel, eat out, play tennis, box, and watch cartoons.
Toks is active in community improvement projects and has served on the boards of directors of several local charities. He coordinates his neighbourhood watch and donates to numerous local, national, and international charities.
Toks describes his purpose as “using my optimism and creativity to assist people in living more fulfilling and joyful lives.”
This blog post is not intended to constitute legal or financial advice.
