Using the Right Landlord Software to Track Your Mortgages.

One of the biggest challenges that we face as landlords is making sure that all of our property related mortgages and loans are properly tracked, and that we know at all times what levels of interest rate we are paying and when they are due to expire.

As your portfolio grows it becomes necessary to use an efficient landlord software solution to help you to better manage your loans.

Here are some tips on what you should look for in this area:

Does the Software Allow You to Track All Loans?

Now, as a landlord you will know that it is not just mortgages that you have on a property. You will also have loans that are secured on your property: personal loans; bridging loans; and even credit card loans.

The property management software should be flexible enough to allow you to record details of any kind of loan that you have.

Does It Remind You When Your Mortgage is Expiring?

This is a key feature, and one that every good landlord software application should have. In fact, it is safe to say that not knowing when mortgage rates are expiring has lead to too many landlords overpaying in interest charges. This, of course, has a negative impact on your cashflow.

Therefore, make sure that your chosen package will notify you when your fixed rate, discounted rate and other tie-in mortgages are expiring.

Fast Mortgage Analysis Reports:

Now, any good property management software package will come with reports that help you to quickly assess the data that you have entered in for your property business.

An essential report is to be able to see a snapshot of the exact standing of the loan. In other words, you want a detailed breakdown of the mortgage/loan including all the mortgage interest and capital repayments that have been made.

Another powerful report is one that I refer to as a ‘Mortgage Broker Summary’ report. This report is a must and is going to save you a huge amount of time when you are looking to get more/new finance. This is because this one report answers all the questions every mortgage company is going to ask about your current loan commitments.

This report will typically include the following details:

· all the mortgages/loans that you have

· who the mortgage/loans are with

· what amounts are outstanding

· what redemption penalties exist if you decide to redeem the loan

· and lots more

About Property Portfolio Software:

Property Portfolio Software’s flagship property management software product Landlord’s Property Manager tracks all property-related income and expenditure and helps landlords to get better organised. If you want easy to use landlord software that will help you to get better organised and slash your accountancy and legal fees then try our landlord solutions today.

The Right Landlord Software Package Can Help You Stop Overpaying in Taxes!

Too many landlords are paying too much in property taxes because they are not claiming for all their allowable expenditure.

There are two reasons why landlords overpay in taxes:

1) they lose their receipts and, therefore, don’t claim the expense

2) they are not aware that they can offset certain costs as genuine expenditure

Losing Receipts!

Not keeping receipts, or losing them, is just like saying to the taxman “I want to pay you more in taxes”!

In many cases landlords can give up a significant chunk of their profits to the taxman just by losing their receipts.

Don’t forget, if you don’t have receipts then you can’t claim for an expense. This is because you have no proof of having actually incurred the expenditure in the first place.

The receipts that most frequently get lost are the ones that tend to be of a nominal value.

However, if you keep on losing such receipts, by the end of the year they will probably equate to a sizeable amount that you are not deducting from your profits. In many cases this can be the difference between paying tax and legitimately avoiding tax.

I always say to investors that whenever they incur an expense, they should ask the question “has the cost been incurred for the property business?”

If the answer is ‘YES’ then make sure that you keep the receipt and enter the expense in to your landlord software package.

Every good landlord software solution will allow you to track all of your expenditure, meaning that you will be able to see all of the expenses that you have incurred for your property business by just a click of a button. Therefore, using such a solution will help you to get better organised as it will visually encourage you keep all receipts.

Is it Really a Business Expense?

Next we come to the issue of knowing whether you can genuinely treat the expense as a business expense and deduct it from your property profits.

Enter, stage left, your accountant!

If you are unsure whether you can claim the expense then simply print off your expenditure list from your property management software, sit down with your accountant and go through the expenses. He will be able to confirm which expenses you can and cannot offset.

Also, any good property management software package will be able to automatically estimate what your tax liability will be. This is because if you are using the software package correctly then you will not just be logging all your property receipts but also entering your property rents as well.

Therefore, producing such a report will save you a significant amount of time in accountancy fees.

About Property Portfolio Software:

Property Portfolio Software’s flagship property management software product Landlord’s Property Manager tracks all property-related income and expenditure and helps landlords to get better organised. If you want easy to use landlord software that will help you to get better organised and slash your accountancy and legal fees then try our landlord solutions today.

Does Your Landlord Software Give You the Right Reminders?

Being a landlord is not as easy as it once was. Roll back a few years and it was easy as buying a property, finding a tenant and then letting it out. There were very few obligations that a landlord had to comply with.

Now, in these challenging times there are many additional roles and responsibilities for landlords and that is why more and more are turning to landlord software to help them get better organized.

A key requirement for any landlord software is to have the ability to remind landlords about when their various policies, certificates and documents are about to expire.

Therefore, any property software package that you choose should have the ability to remind you of the following:

Mortgage and Loan Reminders

The property boom over the past few years has been fuelled by the easy availability of credit. Therefore, if you have managed to obtain the finance for your property at a competitive rate then you need to know when this competitive rate will be expiring, so that you can start to look for alternative finance sooner rather than later.

With this in mind, any good property management software solution should remind you about when you’re fixed/discounted or tracker rate mortgage deals will be expiring.

Safety Certificate Reminders

In the UK there is a legal requirement to have gas safety certificates and also energy performance certificates. Your chosen software package should have the flexibility to allow you to enter any kind of certificate, and then to be reminded before it expires.

Insurance Policies

As a minimum you must have your property covered for buildings insurance. In fact, if you have a mortgage on the property then your lender will insist on this cover. On top of this you may also have contents insurance and other kinds of insurance policies, such as heating, drains, electrical insurance etc.

The last thing you want is to forget to renew such an important insurance policy, so it is essential that your software allows you to set up each and every insurance policy you have.

Tenancy Reminders

You will certainly want to be reminded about when your tenancies are going to expire, so that you can start discussions about extending the tenancy. Also, you will want to be reminded if you have any rent reviews so you can set the rent accordingly.

As you can see, the modern-day landlord has an ever increasing number of roles and responsibilities and, therefore, it is essential that your property management software solution has a flexible reminder system that will help you stay on top of all your property matters.

About Property Portfolio Software:

Property Portfolio Software’s flagship property management software product Landlord’s Property Manager tracks all property-related income and expenditure and helps landlords to get better organised. If you want easy to use landlord software that will help you to get better organised and slash your accountancy and legal fees then try our landlord solutions today.

Landlord’s five top tips for better tenant management

An experienced landlord who specialises in helping landlords get the most from their investment has supplied a series of tips to help better manage tenants.

Amer Siddiq founded property management software firm Property Portfolio Software (PPS).

Its property management software and landlord software solutions are specifically designed to handle the major challenges faced by Landlords.

Amer said: “People in the property business should realise that their tenants are the most important people they deal with, as they are their customers. Looking after tenants correctly determines the cash flow landlords generate from their properties.”

He added: “Failure to manage tenants correctly will most likely result in the landlord losing money, so it’s vital to remember some essential rules to ensure tenants are paying full market rent every time.”

Amer’s top five tips for landlords are:

1 Show them you are a “professional landlord”: This seems obvious but tenants do fear the ‘landlord from hell’. Don’t fall into this category by not addressing property problems immediately, or raising rents without adequate notice.

There is nothing better to demonstrate that you are a serious and well organised landlord than providing new tenants with a welcome pack. This will show you have nothing to hide and will contain essential information about the property, utilities suppliers and any insurance policies the tenant needs to be aware of.

Every good property management software solution will have a tenant welcome pack report built in as one of the standard reports.

2 Have the right policies in place: Make sure you have maintenance contracts for anything which can go wrong in your properties, and tenants have the details in the welcome pack. Covering every property for boiler breakdown, central heating failure, electrical problems and even appliance problems gives them peace of mind and you less hassle. Good property management software will allow you to track and manage any contracts or policies that you have on your properties.

3 Be easy to contact: Always make a point of saying “I can be contacted 24 hours a day”, again to give your tenants peace of mind. By including all essential information in the welcome pack, contact from tenants should be minimal as they will have all the information they need.

4 Get the rent paid by standing order: Make sure your rent is paid by standing order around the time the tenant gets paid by their employer.

5 Be flexible and understanding: Everyone has problems in their life and somewhere down the line; your tenants may have financial difficulties or personal problems. If and when they do, it is important to listen to them, and try to help as best possible. Your understanding could be the difference between you continuing to receive rent or getting no rent at all.

About Property Portfolio Software:

Property Portfolio Software’s flagship property management software product Landlord’s Property Manager tracks all property-related income and expenditure and helps landlords to get better organised. Our UK leading property management software solutions are guaranteed to save you time, money and effort in running all aspects of your property business. If you want easy to use landlord software that will help you to get better organised and slash your accountancy and legal fees then try our landlord solutions today.

The top 5 property management challenges for landlords

What’s the biggest property management challenge facing you as your property portfolio grows?

Our landlord software customers have told us their number one issue is the rising amount of paperwork they have to deal with to keep on top of property management.

We’ve just finished analysing three years worth of feedback from our property management software customers to identify the top five issues facing landlords today.

They are:

1. Increasing paperwork: keeping on top of bills and rental income

2. Staying legal: keeping track of safety certificates and legal documents

3. Good tenant management: making sure they get the information they need

4. Income tax management: knowing what is due and when it is due

5. Maintaining a positive cash flow: battling with the impact of the credit crunch and the withdrawal of favourable mortgage deals

It was this kind of feedback over the last few years that made me realise there is a need for easy to use but powerful property management software.

And that’s why we developed our ground breaking landlord software solutions – to help landlords get better organised!

Here are the top FIVE reasons why landlords use our property management software solutions:

• Helps landlords to get better organised
• Minimises time spent on reconciling information
• The only solution to tackle all major challenges faced by landlords
• The only solution to incorporate landlords tax calculations
• It is designed by landlords for landlords

About Property Portfolio Software:

Property Portfolio Software’s flagship property management software product Landlord’s Property Manager tracks all property-related income and expenditure and helps landlords to get better organised. Our UK leading property management software solutions are guaranteed to save you time, money and effort in running all aspects of your property business. If you want easy to use landlord software that will help you to get better organised and slash your accountancy and legal fees then try our landlord solutions today.

7 questions need to ask before purchasing property management software.

A huge issue for professional landlords as they grow their portfolio is staying organised, according to an experienced property investor.

Amer Siddiq, founder of property management software firm Property Portfolio Software (PPS), believes an essential step for serious landlords is to invest in property management software.

PPS’s software products are specifically designed to handle the major challenges faced by landlords.

But according to Amer, many landlords fail to ask the right questions before purchasing their software.

He said: “Becoming a serious investor brings new problems you won’t have experienced before. The answers are provided by clever landlord software solutions. The next challenge is to pick the right solution.”

Amer believes landlords should ask:

1. How long has the property management software been on the market? This might seem obvious but if the software is from a new start-up company, then it’s natural to be sceptical at first. Because the property market has boomed over the last few years, a number of different landlord software vendors have come to the market and disappeared within a couple of years.

2. How many sales have been achieved to date? Don’t be afraid to ask this vital question as it will give you a good indication as to how popular property management software solution is.

3. What kind of support is provided? The support service that sits behind the product is more important than the product itself. It will determine how successful the product is. It’s inevitable you will need to speak to someone at some point and the speed and manner in which your query is dealt with will either make you a fan or put you off totally!

4. Who has designed the software? Steer clear from software that has been designed by ‘computer techies’. What you want is software that has been designed by experienced landlords.

5. What is the refund policy? It is important that you look into any refund policy that is made available and definitely read the small print.

6. Who is the software recommended by? Check out testimonials and make sure the software is approved and or recognised by the two main landlords associations in the UK, National Landlords Association (NLA) and the Residential Landlords Association (RLA).

7. How often is the software updated? Property management software will always need to be fixed and developed on a regular basis. In the best packages the software can automatically update itself.

About Property Portfolio Software:

Property Portfolio Software’s flagship property management software product Landlord’s Property Manager tracks all property-related income and expenditure and helps landlords to get better organised. Our UK leading property management software solutions are guaranteed to save you time, money and effort in running all aspects of your property business. If you want easy to use landlord software that will help you to get better organised and slash your accountancy and legal fees then try our landlord solutions today.

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