If you’re like me, then you know that there are hundreds of software solutions available for your business or industry. It’s hard to choose the best one. This is especially true for real estate investors who need systems to keep track of their properties, educate new investors, manage tenant screening, create budgets, forecast rental rates, find off market deals, sell markets and so much more. There are so many platforms to choose from! I decided to test many of them myself and share my results with you in the post below. From CRMs to educational courses, this is my review of the best software for real estate investors .
What is Real Estate Investor Software?
Real estate investor software is used to analyze the potential financial performance of a rental property and to monitor the income and expenses, cash flow, and net income of assets at a property and portfolio level.
Choosing the best real estate investor software that’s right for your business can help make the difference between a property barely breaking even or generating solid, consistent positive cash flow year after year.
Features to Look for in a Great Tool for Real Estate Investors
The right real estate investor software for one property owner isn’t always the right choice for another. Property types are different and investment strategies vary. With that in mind, here are some of the most important features to look for when evaluating real estate investment software:
- Flexible enough to handle a variety of property types, including single-family homes, small multifamily properties, and short-term rentals.
- Real estate investment software designed to help you scale up and grow your rental property business.
- Ease of use via a desktop or laptop, tablet, or with a smartphone app for both Android and Apple.
- Ability to monitor asset performance at both the property and portfolio level.
- Creation of a paper trail for income and expense items.
- Upload, organize and store online all rental property documents.
- Little or no learning curve needed to enter a rental property, connect accounts, run financial reports, and view property and portfolio level reports from a single dashboard.
- Export tax-ready financial statements to make year-end reporting go quickly and smoothly.
- Bank-grade security to protect personal data that is never shared with a third party.
- Cost-effective and free of complex features that most rental property investors never use.
- Responsive customer service where you can contact a real live person by phone, email, or even Twitter.
The Best Real Estate Investor Software Systems
Analyst PRO
TheAnalyst PRO is rated by CRE Tech as the #1 investment modeling software, including lease analysis, demographics, and offering memorandums. The software is designed for professional real estate investors who want to complete the most complex investment analysis calculations in minutes. Pricing ranges from $69.99 per month to $599.99 for an annual license.
Argus
Argus provides real estate investor software solutions for owners and investors, asset and portfolio managers, fund and investment managers, and property developers. Features include valuations and cash flow analysis, scenario and risk analysis, and budgeting and strategic planning. Contact for pricing.
DealMachine
DealMachine touts itself as being the #1 app for real estate investors, based on installs and reviews. The company offers multiple software plans, including driving for dollars to build your own list of properties, skip tracing, and real estate data. Pricing begins at $49 per month.
ProAPOD
ProAPOD offers two real estate investment software solutions to start, build, and scale up a rental property business. In just a few minutes investors can calculate the cash flow, rate of return, and generate proformas for residential multifamily and commercial properties.
One-time pricing for software packages ranges from $149.95 to $279.95, plus the Pro RE Calculator suite of 62 real estate calculators for a one-time fee of just $79.95.
PropertyMetrics
PropertyMetrics offers an easy way to create, analyze, and share a commercial real estate proforma online. Investors can build a detailed cash flow proforma from anywhere, run a discounted cash flow analysis, and generate presentation-quality PDF and Excel reports.
The web-based software is simple to use, works with multiple operating systems including Windows, Mac, iOS, and Android. PropertyMetrics offers a 7-day free trial, but you’ll need to contact them directly for monthly pricing.
PropertyTracker
PropertyTracker offers two online tools – Property Evaluator and Property Tracker – to help manage real estate investments. Evaluator takes the guesswork out of finding the best real estate investment by showing all the factors professionals use to compare properties. Tracker is a tool real estate investors use to monitor key financial indicators, learn how to maximize profits, and make smarter management decisions.
Pricing is $37 per month after the free 14-day trial, with optional services for accounting and tax advice ranging from $50 to $150 per hour.
Roofstock Cloudhouse
- Overview: The potential financial performance of single-family rental houses are easy to analyze with the Roofstock Cloudhouse Rental Property Calculator. Simply enter the address of any single-family house in the U.S. and receive a complete forecast of potential return including cash flow, cap rate, cash-on-cash return, gross yield, annualized return, and total return. Customize your forecast based on holding period, down payment amount, and rental income.
- Pricing: Free
- Website: https://www.roofstock.com/cloudhouse
TheAnalyst PRO
- Overview: Commercial real estate analysis software with different modules such as: Analysis reports including investment, loan amount analysis, and target CAP rate analysis; Property reports include location risk analysis and demographic analysis; and Investment Calculators for CAP rate, cash-on-cash, GRM, TVM, IRR, NPV, plus a 1031 exchange calculator.
- Pricing: $599 per year paid annually.
- Website: https://www.theanalystpro.com
Investor Software for Rental Property Management
It’s usually a good idea to hire a local professional property management company to handle your rental property. However, when they’re just starting out, some investors like to take care of their own management to learn the business before they delegate.
Here are five of the best investor software packages for rental property management.
Appfolio
- Overview: Cloud-based property management software designed for all types of property including single-family, multifamily, student housing, commercial property, and an entire rental property portfolio.
- Pricing: Residential pricing begins at $1.25 per unit per month with a minimum monthly fee of $250.
- Website: https://www.appfolio.com/
Avail
- Overview: Built specifically for DIY landlords to help find tenants, view credit history, sign leases, collect rents online, track maintenance, and analyze rent prices. Tenants pay application and background check fees, processing fees for rent payments, and are able to purchase renters insurance through Avail.
- Pricing: Unlimited plan is $0 per unit per month, and the Unlimited Plus plan includes premium features such as next-day rent payments, custom tenant applications and leases, and a property website for $5 per unit per month.
- Website: https://www.avail.co
Buildium
- Overview: Customized property management solutions for rentals, student housing, affordable housing, and HOAs. Features include property accounting and online payments, document storage, maintenance request tracking, renters’ insurance for tenants, rental applications and tenant screening, and a free customizable website for rental listings.
- Pricing: Begins at $47 per unit per month plus additional fees for electronic leases, tenant screening, and online payments.
- Website: https://www.buildium.com
Rentometer
- Overview: One of the biggest mistakes an income property investor can make is under- or over-charging on the rent. Rentometer helps maximize rental income and cash flow by comparing the current rent with other local properties. By entering the address of a property, number of bedrooms, and current rent landlords can make sure they’re not leaving money on the table or losing great tenants because the rent is too high.
- Pricing: Free for a QuickView 7 day access with paid plans starting at $19 per month.
- Website: https://www.rentometer.com
Stessa
- Overview: Stessa offers a way to keep track of your rental property performance, finances, and create a paper trail all in one place. Features include tracking unlimited rental properties, automated income and expense tracking, and exporting tax-ready financials. Even if you’re already using a local property manager, the software can still be used to track your personal business expenses that may not show up on your rental property P&L.
- Pricing: Stessa is 100% free
- Website: https://www.stessa.com/
TurboTenant
- Overview: Streamlines the entire rental process for marketing, tenant screening, applications and online rent collection. Rental marketing services include automatic postings across dozens of websites, professional flyers, lead tracking, application screening, lease preparation, and document storage.
- Pricing: Free for landlords with premium services at an additional fee based on area. Tenants pay an application fee plus online rent payment fee.
- Website: https://www.turbotenant.com
Conclusion
Do you want to get a better return on your money? Have you considered investing in real estate? There are a lot of places that will tell you how to do that, but most of them just give you a basic overview. They don’t really go into the nitty gritty of how you can get started. In this post, I’m going to give you a top 5 list of the best software for real estate investors.