Propertyware Leases

[igilc...@clevelandpropertymanagement.com]

Hi everyone! 

We are really struggling with "new" leases. Renewals we are putting through the Mail Merge Templates. They aren't perfect, but they work for right now and while they're not perfect, the process is mostly easy. We are playing around with the Tags in the Mail Merge Documents for new leases, but we're still pretty stuck. 

We think we need to change the formatting of our lease. We got stuck in a sort of "this is how we've always done it" mindset and tried to force Propertyware to work with our lease. Not going well. The way we are doing it currently, is we edit the document with the address, names, rent amount, etc. and upload it to DocuSign. This has been extremely time-consuming for our Leasing Specialist and we've also lowered the amount of DocuSign envelopes that we can send, so this will very quickly use up our envelope quota. I am working on getting our leases to work a little better, and be as pretty as possible, with Propertyware. We also are having an issue with choosing the type of document our lease is. The lease must be able to be sent to Current User, the prospective tenant(s) and the Primary Property Manager. It needs to also be able to pull all address fields, all names, rent, and statement dates if at all possible. The best label, of course, is Lease Document. However, this requires us to "move in" a tenant into a Propertyware in our system. We do sometimes have prospective tenants back out and choose not to sign, which would leave us with having to then close out the account and go through that whole process again. 

Attached I have a copy of one of our lease templates. Can I see how you have yours formatted with Propertyware's DocuSign feature? Any pro's on here have any advice for those of us that are just starting to figure out the complicated world of Propertyware's mail merge features? We also have to make multiple leases for single and multi-families and utility responsibilities, anyone else have to do this or did you find a way around this?

[Nathan Gesner]

You are not alone. I wanted to start using the e-signing feature over a year ago but don't have the time to format the stupid thing. I've set up a few documents with it but the lease has proven troublesome. I need space for the Tenant name but if I have a lease with four people on it then the space may not be suitable. It's a pain to figure out.

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American West Realty & Management, LLC

[igilc...@clevelandpropertymanagement.com]

Our management agreement is perfect! It's nice and easy, I don't understand why the lease has to be so complicated!

[Katie Chaignot]

This is a long explanation, but here is how we tackle the leases:

1) Approved prospects get converted to a lease, but we put them in "Draft" status so they are not officially moved in - the property remains in Vacant status when a Draft lease is attached.  This allows us to generate the lease document through the DocuSign feature.  Anyone who doesn't end up moving in is then changed from Draft to Terminated.  The Draft feature is a great way to track your upcoming move-ins "at a glance" within Propertyware.  

2) Before drafting the lease, our PMs enter some of the lease specifics into a custom fields we created titled "Lease Merge Fields".  We have these custom Lease Merge fields on the Lease Summary page and others on the Building page.  The Building page fields are great for terms you need pulled into every lease for that property.  The has greatly reduced our lease errors.  You can put anything you want in these fields which can then automatically pull right into the lease.  

Screenshot from our Lease Summary page.  You could use a section like this to enter your Term Length, Pet Fee, etc.

Screenshot of the Lease Merge fields from our Building page.  Having the inventory and utility/landscape/pest responsibility fields pull automatically into the lease has greatly improved our error rate.  Because these are on the building level, they will pull automatically into any lease we write for the property.

3) Then, once we are ready to generate the lease, we create the mail merge.  The PM is set as the first and the last in the signer order.  If you have another person drafting it, you can simply route it to current user as the first "signer" (although they are not actually signing anything yet).  Many of our tags in the leases are set as "text" fields - assigned to the first signer.  Once the lease is created, it comes to our first team member through DocuSign with a bunch of blank text fields. The gray fields below are the ones that pull in from PW (many from those custom fields above), whereas the yellow boxes are text fields.  Once the first signer finishes entering all the data in the text fields, they complete it through DocuSign and it moves on to the next person on the list.  If that's your tenant, then they will receive a fully completed lease with all text boxes completed (and they are not able to edit them).  Once the tenant(s) sign, it comes back to our PM for final execution.  

We are able to draft almost all leases using the one lease merge form we created in PW.  Granted, we did edit our lease format to accommodate some of the PW merge formatting, but the time invested in doing that was completely worth it.  We have been generating our leases through PW for about 3 years now and can't imagine going back.  We love the feature!

Hopefully this helps and isn't too confusing!

Thanks,

	Katie Chaignot Business Manager P. 877.208.8776 F. 877.244.9853 Specializing in Leasing and Sales            We love referrals!
Visit us online!      Phoenix      Dallas      Las Vegas How is your experience with SGI?  Click HERE to "Tell Us What You Think"

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[igilc...@clevelandpropertymanagement.com]

We weren't sure if we could create a Draft, so that's good to know! We don't have all of those field options, are those custom fields that you requested?

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[Katie Chaignot]

We just created them ourselves under Setup/Customize/Custom Fields/(Leases & Buildings).

Thanks,

	Katie Chaignot Business Manager P. 877.208.8776 F. 877.244.9853 Specializing in Leasing and Sales            We love referrals!
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[Nathan Gesner]

Katie, that's awesome! 

I use custom fields but didn't think of using them to fill in the blanks for a DRAFT lease. Very nice example!

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[Rege Beattie]

Interesting stuff. We actually created a mail merge document that we use as our lease. It sounds like it works the same or very similar to the PW lease document. 

Katie, is there an advantage to using the "lease" document?

[Katie Chaignot]

Ours is actually just a lease we created outside of Propertyware and then uploaded as a PDF - into the Mail Merge Document section.  We like the ability to format everything outside of PW, as the Mail Merge Templates they have are not terribly user friendly when it comes to formatting. 

Thanks,

	Katie Chaignot Business Manager P. 877.208.8776 F. 877.244.9853 Specializing in Leasing and Sales            We love referrals!
Visit us online!      Phoenix      Dallas      Las Vegas How is your experience with SGI?  Click HERE to "Tell Us What You Think"

[Celeste Burke]

We struggle with any kind of contract or mailmerge in pw.  It takes way too long.  

[Rege Beattie]

We have ours working very well and would be in real trouble without it. We created a mail merge template and utilized custom fields for things fields could not be pulled from existing fields.  What is taking the most time for you when using a mail merge?

[igilc...@clevelandpropertymanagement.com]

OK we are making progress on our leases! And of course we ran into a new roadblock. What are you doing with your Lead Paint Disclosures? We have them signed by the owner when we first take on management of a property, but we also need the tenant to sign it once we have a tenant. We would normally just scan the signed document into docusign and send it off to the tenant. Our options right now are:

1. Include it in our entire mail merge document, have the owner be Signer 1 and have them sign the disclosure first. Problem: We don't want any time differences or other things delaying a lease signing. They tend to happen very quickly for us and our homeowners at times are not that quick to respond.

2. Print the signed document, scan it back into Propertyware, place the tags, and send it to the tenant separately. Problem: This can become very time consuming and also we would end up having to go in and delete these from the mail merge or else we would end up having a million of them. 

3. Give the Leasing Agent a signed disclosure. Problem: We tend to have to hunt down the agents for documents after the tenants move in, we need to make sure this is a document that is signed like a lease. They can't be in that property without us having that signed document.

Is there something different that you all are doing? Or are you doing one of the options we've thought of and it's working for you?

I appreciate all of you, we've made great strides with your input!

On Thursday, April 25, 2019 at 3:29:06 PM UTC-4, igilc...@clevelandpropertymanagement.com wrote:

[Richard Burton]

We have the owner sign the lead paint addendum once and keep it as a master.

When we approve an applicant we send a copy of the master for tenant signature.

Once signed then we send the lease for signature.

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Richard Burton | Managing Broker, RMP® PowerHouse Property Management, LLC   e | ric...@renterspowerhouse.com p | 678-636-9098 ext 101 f  | 678-853-2531 w | www.RentersPowerHouse.com 9925 Haynes Bridge Rd #200-205 Alpharetta, GA 30022

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[Nathan Gesner]

I am the same as Richard. Owner and Property Manager sign and keep as a Master. You can then scan it up to Propertyware and use Mail Merge for the tenant to initial and sign.

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[igilc...@clevelandpropertymanagement.com]

How many owners and properties do you have? We have 600 owners and 1000 properties, that just seems like a lot of master copies to keep on hand. If you have as many or more and it works for you though, we will give it a shot.

On Thursday, April 25, 2019 at 3:29:06 PM UTC-4, igilc...@clevelandpropertymanagement.com wrote:

[Sweyer Property Management]

Hello! We are working on setting up our lease now, and have ran into an issue with differentiating between Lease Holder and Occupant. Both are coming through as "contacts" on the lease, and we need them to show up in separate areas of the lease, depending on their responsibility. Have you ran into this, and if so, how did you resolve?

Direct Email: mmcde...@sweyerrentals.com

[Isabella Smith]

Hello! Are the Lease Holders the guarantor? There is a tag within the lease mail merge for Guarantor. I would leave them as a contact in the Lease, but change their "role" to Guarantor. That should work! 

[Sweyer Property Management]

Thanks for your response! For legal reasons, we don't have guarantors sign our lease, only our co-signer agreement. I finally got that part figured out! Now my issue is that I need a tag for tenants that have moved out (think roommate situation where one leaves and the other stays) so that the previous tenant on the current lease doesn't show up. I need a "contact role" that won't show up as an other occupant.