Spreadsheet vs Property Management Software

I've used both. Spreadsheets for 3 years. Tried Buildium for a month. Tried TenantCloud for 4 months. Went back to spreadsheets with monitoring on top. (For a head-to-head, see my TenantCloud vs Buildium vs RentGuard comparison.)

Here's an honest comparison based on actually using both approaches to manage real units.

Setup Time

Spreadsheet: 30 minutes. Make a sheet, add your columns, enter your units. Done.

PM Software: 4-8 hours minimum. Enter every property, every unit, every tenant, every lease. Some platforms want bank account info, vendor lists, and accounting setup too.

Winner: Spreadsheet. Not even close.

Daily Operations

Spreadsheet: Open it. Look at it. Update cells manually. Close it. Maybe 5-10 minutes on a normal day, if you remember to open it.

PM Software: Dashboard shows you what needs attention. Automated reminders, status updates, and workflows. But you still need to log in and deal with what it shows you.

Winner: PM Software, if you have enough units to justify the overhead. At 5 units, the spreadsheet is faster. At 20, the software starts saving real time.

Catching Late Payments

Spreadsheet: Only if you check it. If you don't open the sheet for 5 days, you won't know about a late payment for 5 days. There's no notification.

PM Software: Most platforms send automatic alerts when payments are overdue. This is the biggest advantage of software over spreadsheets.

Winner: PM Software. This single feature is worth more than everything else combined.

Maintenance Tracking

Spreadsheet: Works great as a log. Terrible as a workflow tool. You add rows. You update statuses. But it can't send reminders when a request ages. It can't create tickets from tenant submissions.

PM Software: Tenant portals for submissions. Automatic priority sorting. Vendor assignment. Aging alerts. The full workflow.

Winner: PM Software, but with a caveat. If you have 8 units and 3-5 maintenance requests per month, a spreadsheet is fine. The workflow features shine at scale.

Cost

Spreadsheet: Free.

PM Software: $15-174/month depending on the platform and plan. Plus per-unit fees on some platforms.

Winner: Spreadsheet. Obviously.

Flexibility

Spreadsheet: You can do literally anything. Custom columns, custom formulas, custom layouts. It adapts to your workflow.

PM Software: You adapt to its workflow. Want to track something the software doesn't support? Too bad. You either use their system or maintain a parallel spreadsheet.

Winner: Spreadsheet. The freedom to customize is underrated.

Reporting and Tax Prep

Spreadsheet: You build your own reports. Manual but customizable. Export to CSV for your accountant.

PM Software: Built-in reports. Expense categorization. Some integrate with accounting software directly.

Winner: PM Software, especially if your accountant uses QuickBooks or Xero.

The Verdict

Under 15 units: spreadsheet wins on simplicity, cost, and flexibility. The only thing it's missing is alerts. I dig deeper into managing rental properties in spreadsheets in another post.

Over 30 units: PM software wins because the automation saves real time and the features start paying for themselves.

15-30 units: it's a toss-up that depends on your situation.

The Third Option

What if you could keep your spreadsheet but add the one thing it's missing? Alerts.

That's what RentGuard does. Your spreadsheet stays your source of truth. RentGuard monitors it daily and emails you when something needs attention. You get the flexibility of a spreadsheet with the alerting of software.

$15/month. No migration. No learning curve. Just alerts.

If you want the best of both worlds, descoshop.com. Free forever.