TenantCloud vs Buildium vs RentGuard for Landlords

I've used all three of these tools. Not just free trials. Actually used them to manage real units with real tenants. Here's what I think.

The Quick Version

Buildium is for property managers running a business. 50+ units, staff, accounting needs.

TenantCloud is for landlords who want a full platform but don't want to pay Buildium prices.

RentGuard is for landlords who already have a system and just want alerts when something needs attention.

Different tools solving different problems. Let me explain.

Buildium

Price: $55/month (Essential) to $174/month (Premium). Per-unit fees above certain thresholds.

Best for: Property managers with 30+ units who need accounting, tenant portals, and owner reports.

Buildium is a full property management platform. It does accounting, online rent collection, maintenance workflows, tenant screening, lease management, and owner reporting.

I tried it with 12 units. The setup took a full weekend. Entering every tenant, every lease, every unit. By Sunday evening I had it running, but I was exhausted.

The first week was fine. The second week I realized I was spending 30 minutes a day in Buildium doing things I used to do in 5 minutes in my spreadsheet. Entering data, categorizing transactions, checking dashboards I didn't need.

If you have 50 units and someone helping you, Buildium is great. If it's just you and 12 units, it's like using a forklift to move a chair.

TenantCloud

Price: Free (basic) to $35/month (Growth).

Best for: Landlords with 10-30 units who want an affordable all-in-one platform.

TenantCloud is kind of a lighter version of Buildium. It does online rent collection, maintenance tracking, basic accounting, and tenant communication.

The free tier is genuinely useful. You can manage up to 75 units on it. The catch is that the free tier is missing features you'll eventually want, like automatic reminders and advanced reports.

I used TenantCloud for about 4 months. It was fine. The interface is a bit dated feeling. Some things take more clicks than they should. But it works.

My issue was the same as Buildium. It wanted to be my entire system. I had to enter everything into TenantCloud. My spreadsheet became redundant but I didn't trust TenantCloud enough to stop using it. So I was maintaining two systems.

That's the death spiral. Two systems means double the work and half the reliability.

RentGuard

Price: $15/month flat. No per-unit fees.

Best for: Landlords who already track rent in Google Sheets and want alerts without changing their system.

This is the one I built, so obviously I'm biased. But let me tell you why I built it.

After trying Buildium and TenantCloud, I realized I didn't want a platform. I wanted a watchdog. Something that would look at my existing spreadsheet and tell me when something was wrong.

RentGuard connects to your Google Sheet. It reads it every day. When rent is overdue past your grace period, you get an email. When a maintenance request is aging, you get an email. You can mark things handled right from the email.

That's the whole product. No accounting. No tenant portal. No lease management. Just alerts.

Setup takes 5 minutes. You don't migrate data. You don't learn a new interface. You keep doing what you're doing. RentGuard just makes sure you don't miss anything.

How to Pick

Do you have 30+ units and need accounting? Go with Buildium. (I go deeper in my Buildium alternative for small landlords post.)

Do you have 10-30 units and want an affordable all-in-one? Try TenantCloud.

Do you have a spreadsheet that works and just want to stop missing things? That's RentGuard.

Most landlords I talk to with under 20 units fall into that third category. They don't need a new system. They need their current system to be less forgettable. I explain why in why most landlords don't need PM software.

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