Allyssa Haygood-Taylor
Customer relationship management (CRM) software for property management is specifically designed to help property owners or property managers advertise listings, track tenant details and even collect payment. Providers like Pipedrive, Zoho CRM and Buildium offer property management and real estate CRM software that help users maintain relationships with potential and current residents while also keeping record details and marketing solutions within one software.
Top property management software comparison
Collaborative and marketing CRM software types are best for property management because of their internal and external communication features. My guide to the top property management software include general CRM providers as well as industry-specific software. This means the CRM pricing for each provider will range in cost per user, per unit or be a flat fee per month. Below, I’ll dive into how each provider’s pricing plans are structured plus their top features.
Buildium: Best for routine accounting operations
Buildium can handle all back-end and day-to-day accounting operations for property management. Accepting both credit card and ACH payments means users can get paid faster through online payments. ePay can automate collections and payments with vendors, owners and residents. Buildium makes it easy to securely send and receive electronic payments, record and track every transaction automatically, and quickly gain real-time insights into payment activity. Additionally, users can automatically e-file Form 1099s during tax season.
Why I chose Buildium
Buildium is tried and true property management software that offers a solution for a mix of portfolios. Single family, small multifamily, community associations, student housing, commercial spaces and affordable housing units can all implement Buildium for their needs.
While Buildium can be a one-stop solution for property management, its pricing is unique. It is priced at a flat monthly or yearly fee, with add-ons available. If you’d rather find a provider based on the number of users or units, I suggest Pipedrive or Funnel Leasing.
Pricing
- Essential: Starting at $55 per month or $593 per year. Includes accounting, maintenance, tasks, violations, resident and board member communications and online portals. Property inspections and eSignatures can be added on for a fee.
- Growth: Starting at $174 per month or $1,880 per year. This plan includes everything in Essential plus 5 free bank accounts, unlimited eSignatures and enhanced tenant screening.
- Premium: Starting at $375 per month or $4,050 per year. This tier supports all Growth features plus open API and a dedicated growth consultation for new client leads.
Features
- Lease templates: Set up templates for all lease documents and collect applicant signatures from any device.
- Marketing website: Build a free property management website to boost brand, advertise listings and show off services.
- Bookkeeping: Deliver precise bookkeeping and real time financial data by viewing all company and property financials.
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Pipedrive: Best for full funnel visibility
Users can have full funnel visibility with Pipedrive’s intuitive and visual pipeline dashboard. Realtors and property managers are able to know the exact status of each property or listing, indicating what the next steps should be. Additionally, Pipedrive collects and organizes property details within the tool. This allows for follow-ups and reminders to be set to help nurture potential resident relationships.
Why I chose Pipedrive
Pipedrive is extremely scalable CRM software. It can be a CRM for small businesses, startups and even enterprises. Used by over 100,000 companies, Pipedrive can be adapted into multiple industries, including financial services, call centers, government, marketing and more.
While Pipedrive offers a unique solution for real estate and property management companies, it’s a more generalized provider that would need to be customized to fit your specific needs. If you want an out-of-the-box solution, I recommend considering Buildium or Funnel Leasing first.
For more information, read my full Pipedrive review.
Pricing
- Essential: $14 per user per month, billed annually, or $24 per user when billed monthly. The Essential plan includes people and organization management, product catalog, sales assistant and more.
- Advanced: $29 per user per month, billed annually, or $39 per user when billed monthly. The Advanced plan offers all Essential features plus automations, two-way email sync, group emailing and more.
- Professional: $49 per user per month, billed annually, or $64 per user when billed monthly. This tier supports all Advanced features and contacts timeline, free Smart Docs add-on, automatic assignment and more.
- Power: $64 per user per month, billed annually, or $79 per user when billed monthly. The Power plan includes all Professional offerings plus phone support, 500 custom fields and more.
- Enterprise: $99 per user per month, billed annually, or $129 per user when billed monthly. This tier offers all mentioned features plus up to 180 active automations, unlimited teams and unlimited custom permissions.
Features
- Communication: Communicate with residents with built-in email, SMS, social media and web form channels.
- Mobile app: Take audio notes between showings, get reminders to follow up on time and update property or client details from anywhere with the Pipedrive mobile app.
- Lead segmentation: Identify lead sources and manage referrals and segment lists in your lead capture forms by filtering leads by budget, timeline or zip code.
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Zoho CRM: Best for built-in analytics
Zoho CRM users can measure every aspect of the sales pipeline, from marketing campaigns and spending to deal closure, with over 40 pre-built reports. Zoho CRM’s Analytics tracks progress toward company goals, agent activity, compensation and neglected deals in the pipeline. Users can even set up revenue forecasts based on territories or properties, measure KPIs using target meters and track lease expirations.
Why I chose Zoho CRM
Zoho CRM is top-scoring marketing and communication CRM software. With its multichannel marketing and intelligent sales tools, users can customize the platform to meet their specific needs. By utilizing the AI-powered sales assistant, users can view predictive analytics, generate content and enrich data.
Similar to Pipedrive, Zoho CRM is a general CRM with real estate and property management capabilities. If you’d prefer software built with the renters’s experience in mind, look into Funnel Leasing.
To learn more, head over to our Zoho CRM review.
Pricing
- Free CRM: Free for up to three users and comes with lead and document management and a mobile app.
- Standard: $14 per user per month, billed annually, or $20 per user when billed monthly. Users can access email insights, sales forecasting and multiple currencies.
- Professional: $23 per user per month, billed annually, or $35 per user when billed monthly. This tier includes all Standard features, plus assignment rules and unlimited custom reports and dashboards.
- Enterprise: $40 per user per month, billed annually, or $50 per user when billed monthly. This plan introduces all AI-powered tools, plus email segmentation, auto-response and more.
- Ultimate: $52 per user per month, billed annually, or $65 per user when billed monthly. Ultimate grants access to all mentioned features plus access to Zoho Analytics.
Features
- Omnichannel communication: Connect with future and current residents via email, telephone, social media, SMS, live chat, WhatsApp or web forms.
- Third-party integrations: Enable sales with API integrations or shuffle between Google Workspace and Microsoft 365.
- Zoho Analytics: Visualize business data with actionable insights, multi-dimensional reports and filter reports that make it easy to share and export Excel, CSV or PDF files.
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Funnel Leasing: Best for intuitive tenant portal
Through Funnel Leasing’s renter management software, users can engage with new renters and retain residents by sending the right message at the right time, from inquiry to renewals. They can answer resident questions, post community updates via bulk messaging and send automated renewal communications. Funnel Leasing offers portfolio-wide data insights to power the entire renter, resident and team experience on a single platform. The SOC 2 Type II certified, enterprise-grade marketing and communications platform covers all communication securely.
Why I chose Funnel Leasing
Funnel Leasing provides a CRM tool with AI and automation features that prioritize the renter experience. As secure, PMS-agnostic software, Funnel Leasing focuses on renters and integrates with the rest of your tools to centralize operations. It is highly scalable for enterprises and is used by eight of the National Multifamily Housing Council top 20.
Funnel Leasing’s pricing is unique, as it is based on the number of units in each multifamily property. If you would prefer a similar property management software at a flat monthly fee, I suggest checking out Buildium.
Pricing
- Foundation: $1.80 per unit per month. This plan comes with syndication, CRM, marketing automation and AI chatbot.
- Automation: $3.25 per unit per month. This tier comes with all Foundation offerings plus VLA software.
- Specialization: $4.35 per unit per month. Specialization offers all Automation tools plus Voice AI and Centralized Comms Hub.
- Full Funnel: $6.85–$8.35 per unit per month. Users of this plan receive access to all tools mentioned above, in addition to online leasing and ResApp.
Features
- Virtual leasing: Funnel’s virtual leasing agent (VLA) is powered by machine learning and natural language processing to seamlessly automate every step of the renter journey, from initial inquiry through renewals.
- AI tools: Qualify and filter inquiries with preset criteria that escalate qualified, decision-ready leads.
- Triggers: Follow up with leads via built-in customizable triggers, such as approving applications that meet income requirements.
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Features
- Listing management: Integrate Propertybase with all major MLS for agents to create, edit and syndicate listings.
- Automatic follow-up: Reach new leads and increase referral business through automated branded emails.
- Mobile app: Access all contacts, emails, marketing campaigns and listings from a central location.
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How do I choose the right property management CRM for my business?
I recommend you begin by following best practices to learn how these property management CRM software can provide real solutions for your organization. Starting with the providers on my list, consider signing up for free trials or demos and mapping out their onboarding process with their sales team.
Here are some questions to ask before committing to a paid subscription:
- Does this CRM tool integrate with all of my existing tech tools?
- Does this CRM tool offer the tenant management tools that my business needs?
- Are the core sales features offered by this software robust enough to streamline my sales process?
- Does this CRM fit my budget, or would a free CRM be better to start with?
- How quick is the onboarding process to get started using this tool?
- Can the CRM software scale up to adapt to my growing business?
- Does this CRM tool have any in-market specialization in my industry?
Methodology
To evaluate each CRM provider’s property management tools, I used my in-house rubric with outlined criteria of CRM industry standards. After running each CRM software through this rubric, an algorithm calculates an overall rating. I use those scores and major feature callouts to assign each software an ideal use case that represents the software’s best offering.
Below is the breakdown of my predefined criteria:
- Cost: Weighted 25% of the total score.
- Core features: Weighted 25% of the total score.
- Customizations: Weighted 15% of the total score.
- Integrations: Weighted 15% of the total score.
- Ease of use: Weighted 10% of the total score.
- Customer support: Weighted 10% of the total score.