Manage Your Rental With Ease
Are You Keeping a Tenant Ledger?
RHAWA Staff | Resource Specialists
If you aren’t keeping a tenant ledger, you should be! In the pre-digital days, a ledger was how lists of things were quickly and easily recorded in an organized fashion. Ledger books recorded financial transactions, inventory, and much more. Recording transactions with your tenant is just as important as a business keeping tracking of its finances!
There are several reasons to keep a good ledger of rent received, maintenance requests, complaints, lease violations, when they were late, any fees incurred, and other things that occurred with the tenancy. A ledger can hold all this information in an easy to read and organized manner. It’s one of the most important things in your business.
Starting and keeping a tenant ledger for each tenancy isn’t the easiest thing in the world unless you’re familiar with one already. Often, we’ll write about how important something is to do but we don’t always have a handy resource to make it possible. This time is different. Here at RHAWA, we’ve made it easier than ever before because we now have made a tenant ledger for you! The ledger is a simple Microsoft Excel spreadsheet that you can download from RHAwa.org/forms. Once downloaded, you can fill it up with information about the tenant and begin recording right away. All you need for this to function is a computer (mac or PC) and Excel (with some basic knowledge). If you want to keep a paper copy of this information, our file may be a handy way to create that resource for you, or you can print the file and fill in as you would like.
Why is it important to keep a tenant ledger?
It helps during an eviction
Being able to show that a tenant paid late is always helpful. When it comes to effectively proceeding through an eviction, staying organized is important. Having your tenant ledger at the ready to show how the tenant has failed to fulfill the terms of the lease is vital to making sure that you get the money or outcome that you’re seeking.
It helps you keep records of income
Being able to easily add up your income from rent helps start the process of accurately keeping records for your business. Rental housing is a business and business works best when it’s highly organized. Having good records of income and maintenance can also be important during tax time.
It helps you during disputes / court action
Going to court over a deposit refund statement? Need to go to small claims court for other monies? A solid tenant record is going to be your friend in any court proceeding. Not only do you look organized (judges like that), but you don’t have to spend hours digging through a pile of paper or through boxes looking for the information that you need. You can proceed through a legal action with confidence and with much less stress.
It is the start of keeping your records organized
It’s pretty easy for a business to devolve into an entity that produces a product or service and piles up receipts, paper, and other documentation. If that pile of paper isn’t organized in some fashion, then trying to bring organization to it later can be stressful and time consuming. Keeping a tenant ledger is like cleaning one corner of a room. When one corner is clean, it’s easier to clean the rest of the room. The same thing goes with your tenant records. Starting and keeping good tenant records is vital. Our tenant ledger makes it easy!
It saves space in keeping files for your business
This is where the digital revolution can be helpful. Rather than hanging onto a lot of paper that might constitute a tenant record or ledger, you can keep your notes in this convenient and central location. Even if you don’t choose to use the RHAWA file, it’s a great jumping off point to figure out how you can keep your tenant information easily organized. This makes your rental housing business much more efficient and much less stressful.
Download the Tenant Ledger today from RHAWA.org/forms and get started organizing your tenant records!
