It’s the first of the month, and instead of chasing down tenants for rent, juggling a separate screening tool, and tracking maintenance requests over text, you want all of it handled in one place. That’s what property management software is supposed to do, and not all of it does.
Quick Answer
The property management software features that matter most are online rent collection, tenant screening, lease management with e-signatures, accounting integration, and maintenance tracking. RentRedi includes all five, plus free listing syndication, unlimited team seats, and 24/7 human support, all at one flat price no matter how many units you manage.
Here’s what to look for in each category, and how RentRedi handles it.
Rent Collection & Accounting
Let’s be real: rent collection and accounting can be the biggest headaches when it comes to managing properties. Not only do you have to figure out a decent and efficient way to collect rent, but you also have to crunch those numbers come tax season.
Property management software is built to take that load off your plate. The most important features to look for are online rent collection, tenant screening, lease management, accounting integration, and maintenance tracking. RentRedi’s software includes:
RentRedi’s 2025 landlord and tenant survey found that units with tenants on autopay reach a 99% on-time rent rate, compared to 87% without autopay, and credit reporting is linked to a 13% increase in on-time rent. The right features don’t just save time. They change whether rent shows up on time.
- Online Rent Collection: The ability to collect rent payments digitally is a must-have. Look for software that supports multiple payment methods, ACH, credit cards, and even cash, along with automated reminders and late fee calculations. This speeds up the payment process, reduces delinquencies, and ensures all transactions are securely recorded for easy tracking.
- Comprehensive Tenant Screening: Effective tenant screening tools help reduce risk by automating background, credit, and eviction checks. The best platforms offer customizable screening criteria, prequalification forms, and instant processing, giving landlords a complete view of each applicant’s suitability and helping ensure fair, consistent leasing decisions.
- Lease Management and E-Signatures: Digital lease management simplifies the creation, signing, and renewal of rental agreements. Seek software that provides customizable templates, secure document storage, and e-signature functionality. Automated renewal reminders and centralized access to lease documents help landlords stay organized and compliant with local regulations.
- Accounting Integration: Integrated accounting tools save real hours tracking income, expenses, and deposits. The top property management software syncs with major accounting platforms, offers automatic reconciliation, and generates tax-ready reports. RentRedi’s AI-powered accounting suite automatically categorizes expenses and generates Schedule E summaries, so tax prep doesn’t mean rebuilding a year of records by hand.
- Maintenance Request Tracking: Centralized maintenance management enables tenants to submit requests (with photos or videos) via a portal or app. Landlords can assign tasks, track progress, and keep tenants updated, all within the software. This feature improves response times, ensures clear communication, and creates a documented history for each issue.
Reporting rounds this out: built-in tools show cash flow, occupancy rates, and maintenance costs at a glance, and customizable financial reports make it easy to monitor performance and catch trends before they become problems. Automated reminders, shared updates, and in-app messaging keep tenants and any team members on the same page without a separate messaging app. And when a unit opens up, built-in listing syndication and a professional marketing page help you fill it faster instead of juggling separate advertising tools.
Prioritizing these capabilities ensures that your rental business remains organized, efficient, and ready to grow.
The Unique Benefits of Property Management Software for Small Landlords
For small landlords, those managing just a handful of units, property management software closes the gap between what one person can realistically handle and what a full-time leasing agent, accountant, and maintenance coordinator would normally cover. The advantage isn’t convenience. It’s the difference between a spreadsheet-and-sticky-notes operation and a business that can grow.
Consider a landlord like Maria, who owns three units in Ohio, a common scenario, not a specific customer. Instead of tracking rent in a spreadsheet and chasing paper checks, she gets automatic reminders, digital payments, and one dashboard for every property. Tenant screening runs through the same system, so she isn’t juggling separate background-check and credit-check vendors. When a maintenance request comes in, she gets a video instead of a vague phone call, and can loop in a contractor without leaving the app.
Landlords like Maria aren’t a small slice of the market. Individual investors own roughly 70% of rental units in properties with four or fewer units, according to Census Bureau Rental Housing Finance Survey data cited by the Congressional Research Service. Software built for a handful of units, not a few hundred, is built for how most of the rental market operates. For a deeper look at what to prioritize on your first platform, see our guide to property management software for small landlords.
Prequalifications, Applications, & Tenant Screening
Now, tenant screening. There’s a big one! After all, who you put in your rentals is just as important for protecting your properties as landlord insurance, inspections, and maintenance.
What you’ll want is to ensure that any tenant screening provides you with a complete picture of the applicant.
RentRedi’s tenant screening features include:
- Prequalification form where the tenant can submit self-reported income & credit score
- Full, comprehensive application form built into the app
- Complete tenant screening check: credit, criminal, and eviction report
- Auto-tenant screening to pull background checks when the tenant submits an application
RentRedi’s own platform data backs this up: tenants who were screened through RentRedi pay rent 17 days faster on average, and pay on time about 90% of the time, 7 percentage points higher than tenants who weren’t screened (source).
Maintenance Requests & Coordination
Maintenance can be a huge hurdle between landlords and tenants, but at the end of the day, both parties just want to keep the property well-maintained and in good shape. That’s where maintenance requests and coordination centers come in.
Now, with RentRedi, there are two major ways to handle maintenance. Either with yourself & your own team or with an outsourced contractor & coordination team, whatever’s easiest and most efficient for your business.
- Maintenance video requests. Get a video of the issue sent right to your RentRedi dashboard.
- Add your maintenance team for free so they can record a video of the issue.
- Tenants get status updates.
- Outsource your maintenance to a premium maintenance team. They will field all calls and dispatch contractors to your rentals as needed.
For a deeper look at handling repairs efficiently, see our ultimate guide to rental property maintenance.
Listings & Marketing
Of course, you can manage a rental if it has no tenants! Finding tenants via advertising is naturally a critical part of property management software.
Fortunately, RentRedi offers a variety of tactics you can use to list your rentals and find tenants.
- Listings to Zillow & Realtor.com
- Professional marketing page
- Use a professional marketing page to post on Facebook, Craigslist, website text, email, or any other social media you prefer
For more on getting the most reach out of a listing, see our guide to the best rental listing syndication sites and how syndication improves applicant quality.
Tenant & Team Communications
The number one priority of any good business? COMMUNICATION.
In RentRedi, for example, you get:
- Unlimited units, properties, & tenants
- Add your teammates, property managers, and maintenance for free
- Automatic rent reminders
- Customizable text and email notifications
- Document storage & lease signing
RentRedi’s Chat 2.0 update centralizes all of this into one searchable thread instead of scattered texts, emails, and voicemails.
Software Comparison and Selection Criteria
The right platform should meet your needs today and still work when your portfolio doubles. Three things matter most when comparing options.
Scalability and portfolio fit matter most over the long run. Consider the types and number of properties you manage now and where you expect to be in a year or two, and look for pricing and features that adapt as your needs evolve so a growing portfolio doesn’t force a disruptive migration later.
Ease of use counts just as much as feature depth. The best property management software is intuitive for both landlords and tenants, with a straightforward interface and support resources that shorten the learning curve on both desktop and mobile.
Integration with your existing tech stack is worth checking too. Confirm that the software connects to your accounting platform, payment processors, and any other systems you already use, since strong integrations eliminate double data entry and give you a single, clear view of your property management activity. Our breakdown of flat-fee, per-unit, and tiered pricing models can help you compare what each structure actually costs as your portfolio grows.
Power of Mobile Access for Landlords
Managing rentals from a desk isn’t realistic anymore. Landlords are doing inspections, meeting contractors, and running errands, and property management software needs to keep up wherever they are. A mobile app that sends real-time alerts for maintenance requests, new applications, and rent payments means nothing waits until you’re back at a computer.
RentRedi’s app holds a 4.8-star rating for a reason: landlords can review a maintenance video, sign a lease, or check on a rent payment from a phone in the time it takes to grab coffee. That immediacy is what reduces the back-and-forth with tenants and contractors, not a longer feature list. See how RentRedi’s mobile app is built for this kind of on-the-go management.
Common Mistakes When Choosing Property Management Software
Landlords often make the same few mistakes when evaluating property management software.
Picking based on price alone. The cheapest plan can end up costing more once per-unit fees and add-ons are factored in as a portfolio grows.
Ignoring tenant experience. If tenants find the app confusing, calls and late payments go up no matter how good the landlord-side features are.
Skipping the screening step. Manually vetting applicants, or using a screening tool that doesn’t check credit, criminal, and eviction history together, is one of the most common ways landlords end up with a costly tenancy.
Treating maintenance as an afterthought. Software that doesn’t let tenants submit photos or video makes every repair take longer to diagnose and resolve.
For a longer rundown of what trips up new landlords most often, see our guide to common landlord mistakes.
The features above cover what to look for and how RentRedi handles each one. Here are the questions landlords ask most before making a switch.
FAQ
What features are included in property management software?
The core features are online rent collection, tenant screening, lease management with e-signatures, accounting integration, and maintenance tracking. These affect cash flow and risk the most, so they matter more than extras like marketing tools. RentRedi includes all five in one flat-priced plan, so you’re not stitching together separate tools for each task.
Does RentRedi offer maintenance request tracking for landlords?
Yes. Tenants can submit a maintenance request with a video directly from the RentRedi app, so landlords see the actual issue instead of a vague description. Landlords can add maintenance team members for free, assign the request, and send tenants status updates from the same dashboard, or outsource to a premium maintenance team if they’d rather not handle it themselves.
How does online rent collection work in property management software?
Tenants pay through the app by ACH, debit or credit card, or cash at retail locations, and the platform tracks every payment automatically. RentRedi runs a balance check before processing to cut down on failed payments, charges a flat $1 ACH fee, and sends automatic reminders before rent is due, so landlords spend less time chasing payments manually.
What does tenant screening include?
A complete tenant screening report covers credit history, criminal background, and eviction records, plus identity verification so landlords know they’re screening the actual applicant. RentRedi’s screening is tenant-paid, not a landlord cost, and results come back automatically once the applicant submits their information, so there’s no separate vendor to manage.
Can property management software handle accounting and tax prep?
Yes, if it includes built-in accounting rather than requiring a separate export to spreadsheets. RentRedi automatically generates profit and loss statements and IRS Schedule E reports, and its AI receipt scanner reads handwritten receipts and categorizes expenses by property, so tax season doesn’t mean rebuilding a year of records from scratch.
How much does property management software cost?
Pricing varies widely, some platforms charge per unit and get expensive fast as a portfolio grows, while others bundle features into tiers that push landlords toward upgrades. RentRedi charges one flat rate regardless of how many units you manage, with unlimited free teammate seats, so the cost of adding a property is the same as running one. See our pricing page for current plans, or read the full cost breakdown in Is RentRedi Worth the Money?
How important is scalability when choosing property management software?
Very. Software that charges per unit gets expensive fast as a portfolio grows, and switching platforms later means migrating years of tenant and payment history. RentRedi charges one flat rate regardless of unit count, so landlords can add properties without recalculating their software costs every time.
The Bottom Line
The property management software features that matter most come down to five things: rent collection, tenant screening, lease management, accounting, and maintenance tracking. Beyond that, mobile access and real support (not just a help article) are what determine whether the software saves time day to day.
Next steps:
- List the three features you can’t operate without, then compare platforms against that shortlist instead of a full feature list.
- Ask any platform you’re considering how pricing changes as your portfolio grows.
- Test the tenant-facing side, not just the landlord dashboard, since a confusing tenant app creates more support calls than it saves.
Landlords Choose RentRedi
Landlords rate the RentRedi app 4.8 stars for rent collection, tenant screening, and maintenance, all in one place.