By Paul Bridgewater, CEO, ResMan, March 31, 2021
Owners and managers in property management constantly look for ways to eliminate friction from the payment process for residents and internal teams. Creating a successful payment program requires an excellent relationship and positive experience between the business and resident. To facilitate this relationship, property owners turn to property technology (proptech) with a comprehensive property management platform that includes native payment capabilities.
The challenge of managing payments across multiple systems
Property management is a personal business. Companies are dealing with two fundamentally personal aspects of a resident’s life—their homes and money. Trust is inherently linked to a company’s brand and ensuring that prospects and residents associate trust with the brand is critical.
When properties use third-party payment sites, they create a disconnect in the brand experience. Leading consumers to a third-party payment site that’s unfamiliar creates friction in the user’s experience and can make them second guess their payments’ security. Consumers care about online payment security, and companies need to instill confidence in them by creating a secure, familiar payment experience.
How integrated payments benefit properties and consumers
The days of properties needing a standalone specialized payment service are over. Property management platforms with a payment facilitator (payfac) model create a compelling, seamless payment experience for the consumer while simplifying the management company’s processes.
The top platforms have rapidly advanced their payfac models to provide a better resident experience than could be delivered only a few years ago. They offer flexible solutions with multiple payment options to meet the consumers where they need to be met.
True flexibility with payment options should be equally important to property management companies. While most people want to streamline payments with credit cards and autopay, some still use checks and money orders. Property owners who understand their residents’ habits and lifestyles can make the necessary accommodations to receive payments.
It’s safe to say that most consumers prefer online options to save time and simplify the payment process. Online payment solutions aren’t just nice to have anymore—the consumer expects them.
Creating property value through payments
By leveraging a property management platform with native payment capabilities, managers and owners can create brand equity and cultivate a higher level of trust with their residents. Managing resident information and payments on a single platform reduce exposure of payment credentials and data issues. Residents can feel secure sharing their information on a site they trust.
Because of that financial trust, it makes it easier for management to bundle ancillary products to create additional value, like payment acceptance, insurance, credit score improvement programs, and short-term loans. Not only does this generate revenue, but it also builds on the property/resident relationship, positively impacting retention rates.
There are also benefits for the company itself. With payment processing added to their platform’s subscription model, property managers no longer have to manage a relationship with another provider. Platforms, like ResMan, offer unlimited ACH, so companies no longer need to forecast and budget for the expected number of transactions.
Future innovations in Proptech
Now, software companies across the proptech spectrum quickly recognize the value vertical payment solutions provide to themselves, property management companies, and consumers. Integrating payments into the property management platform instead of relying on merchant referrals and third-party solutions opens doors for platforms to increase their value and the value of the properties they serve.
The long-untapped revenue potential for properties is just the beginning. By embedding payment processing and acceptance into the core platform, property management software providers transform the way properties provide value.
Proptech leaders are looking to other industries, including e-commerce, where payment functionality in the core platform is a vertical solution that builds the relationship between business and consumer. Property management platforms are no longer solely a solution for managing operations—they can now be growth partners.
While a native payments solution strengthens brand equity and streamlines rental payments, it can also reduce attrition, or lease turnover, by delivering increased value. Ultimately, the property management software cost itself is inconsequential to the revenue streams generated and the reduction in lease attrition.
Paul Bridgewater is the CEO of ResMan, the preferred growth partner driving profitability and efficiency for nearly a thousand property management companies across the US. Paul was previously CEO of Sage Payment Solutions (now Paya). Focused on SaaS, payments, and fintech industries, Paul has more than 25 years of achievement spanning the Americas and Europe.
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