Best Tips for Tracking Rental Property Expenses?

Hi everyone,

I am relatively new to managing rental properties and want to make sure I am staying on top of all my expenses. I have read about different methods, but I would love to hear what’s worked best for others.

How do you all keep track of your rental property expenses: ??

I am particularly interested in simple, effective systems or tools that don’t take a lot of time to manage. Do you use any specific apps or software: ?? Or do you prefer good old spreadsheets: ??

Also, how do you ensure you don’t miss any deductible expenses throughout the year: ??

Any advice on best practices, potential pitfalls to avoid, or tools that have made your life easier would be really appreciated. I already checked out this blog https://www.stessa.com/blog/how-to-track-rental-property-expenses-flutter/ it helped me a lot but now I am looking for more tips and advice.

Thanks in advance for your help…! :pray:

Looking forward to learning from your experiences…! :roll_eyes:

Marcos Andrew

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@marcosandrew143 Great question. Keep in mind that Stessa is technically the answer to your question as its sole purpose is to track your income and expenses related to your rental properties.

This is what I do for myself and my landlord clients:

  1. Cloud storage for receipts. I prefer Dropbox but GDrive or another alternative is fine depending on your ecosystem. I use the app to scan or download direct from email depending on where the receipt/invoice originates. Stessa can also accept your receipts. You can e-mail forward to Stessa in some situations, use the Stessa app to scan, etc. I use both as redundancy. If Stessa shuts down tomorrow, your documentation is gone. Always save a backup. Hard copies are nice but they fade, get damaged, or get lost.
  2. Spreadsheet as a checklist. I have a master checklist that I use as I progress throughout the year. Electric bill - January “x”, February “x”, etc. That way I know it is recorded in Stessa and whether or not I have outstanding items for the month in case I am waiting on someone else to deliver.
  3. Spreadsheet for tax time. I also provide my clients an end of the year checklist for their tax documents as they arrive in the mail around January. 1099s and all of the other fun stuff.

Full disclosure, I offer bookkeeping services and consulting. If you want a crash course in this to save you hours of pain, confusion, and second guessing yourself, I’m happy to help.

-Tom

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