Free Property Management Software for Landlords (Honest Limits)

What free really costs

Every app on this page charges you nothing, and every one of them earns money somewhere else. Usually that’s your tenants.

Take a five-unit owner with rents around $1,650. If every tenant pays by bank transfer, that’s 60 payments a year:

• TurboTenant Free: $2 per payment, so your tenants pay $120 a year between them.
• Avail Unlimited: $2.50 per payment, or $150 a year.
• Innago: $2 per payment, or $120 a year. You can choose to cover it, which moves the $120 onto your books.
• Stessa Essentials: $2 per payment to an outside bank, $0 if you deposit into Stessa’s own cash management account.

Card payments cost a lot more. A $1,650 rent paid by card on TurboTenant runs 3.49%, or about $57.59 that month. Most landlords steer tenants to ACH and treat cards as a backup.

Then there’s screening. Applicants usually pay, and the price runs from $30 (Innago, or Avail’s single report) up to $55 (TurboTenant’s free plan, or Avail’s bundle). In a slow rental market, a $55 fee can put off good applicants, so it’s worth knowing who charges what.

What to look for in a free plan

Free online property management software varies more than the $0 price tag suggests. Before you sign up, check these:

1. Is rent collection included? Hemlane’s free Starter plan doesn’t collect rent. Everything else here does.
2. Who pays the ACH fee, and can you change that? Innago lets you absorb it. TurboTenant removes it only on Pro.
3. Leases and e-signatures. Avail includes state-specific leases with e-sign for free. Stessa charges $15 per state lease and has no e-sign on the free plan. TurboTenant’s unlimited e-sign is on paid plans.
4. Books that survive tax season. You want income and expenses by property, ready for Schedule E. Stessa does this best. The rest offer lighter tracking.
5. Bank connections. TurboTenant’s free plan allows one connected bank account. If you keep a separate account per property, that matters.
6. A sane upgrade path. Know what the next tier costs before you load 10 leases into an app.

The picks

TurboTenant: the most complete free plan

TurboTenant’s free plan handles marketing with listing syndication, online applications, screening, rent collection, maintenance requests and basic accounting. There’s no unit limit stated, and the vendor pitches it at 1 to 50 doors.

The trade-offs are on your tenants and your patience. Tenants pay $2 per ACH payment and 3.49% on cards. Applicants pay $55 for screening (credit, criminal and eviction). Listing review can take up to 48 hours on the free plan, you get one connected bank account, and transactions are imported by hand. Reviews often mention tenant pushback on the fees, and some landlords find the app harder to find their way around than expected.

The upgrade math is clear. Pro costs $199 a year for 1 to 10 units and makes tenant ACH free. At 10 units paying monthly, your tenants save $240 a year, so Pro starts to pay for itself somewhere around 9 units if fee complaints bother you.

Wrong for: landlords who want income verification on the free plan, or anyone who needs an owner portal.

Avail: free state leases with e-sign

Avail’s free Unlimited plan covers listings on 19 sites, applications and screening, state-specific leases with e-sign, online rent, maintenance tracking, income and expense tracking, and messaging. Units are unlimited.

Tenant ACH is the highest here at $2.50 per payment, and cards run 3.5%. Screening is a $55 bundle or a $30 single report, and the screening cost acts as the application fee. Some reviewers describe the applicant dashboard as clunky, and there are reports of payment delays and long support waits.

Unlimited Plus costs $9 per unit a month and waives tenant ACH. That works at one or two units ($108 to $216 a year) but scales badly: 10 units would be $1,080 a year.

Wrong for: anyone who wants custom lease templates or custom application questions without paying per unit.

Innago: one free plan, and you can absorb the fees

Innago has a single plan, and it’s free from 1 unit to 500. It includes late fee and invoice automation, online leasing and document storage, financial tracking, work orders, messaging, applications, screening and online payments.

What sets it apart is fee control. ACH is $2 and cards are 2.99%, both paid by the tenant by default, but you can choose to cover them. Screening runs $30 to $35, plus $10 for income verification.

The limits: accounting is lighter than paid competitors, there’s no bank sync, and only one super-admin can add users. If you co-own with a partner, settle who holds that account.

Wrong for: landlords who want bank feeds pulling transactions in automatically.

Hemlane: free listing and screening, no rent collection

Hemlane’s Starter plan is free and lists your unit on Apartments.com, Zillow and 7 more sites, with applicant screening ($40, paid by the tenant) and rental accounting. That’s where it stops. Rent collection, e-sign and late fees start on Basic, at a $28 platform fee plus $2 per unit a month, which works out to $30 a month for one unit or $38 for five.

Basic does include $0 ACH for tenants, so it’s a fair option once you’re ready to pay. Reviewers flag one case of a rent payment held until the landlord subscribed to a paid plan, and no weekend support.

Wrong for: anyone who wants online rent collection for free.

Stessa: free bookkeeping to pair with the rest

Stessa is accounting first. The free Essentials plan includes unlimited properties, bank feeds, basic reports, vacancy marketing, screening, maintenance tracking and online rent. Rent collection costs tenants $2 per ACH to an outside bank, or nothing if you deposit into Stessa’s cash management account.

Limits on the free plan: one portfolio, 5 receipt scans a month, $15 per state lease and no e-sign. The Schedule E report sits on the Manage plan at $12 a month billed annually. Reviews mention bank connections that need refreshing and slow support.

Plenty of landlords run TurboTenant or Avail for tenants and Stessa for the books. That covers most of the job for $0 a month.

Wrong for: anyone who wants double-entry accounting or a lot of receipt scanning on the free plan.

Free plans side by side

Tool	Rent collection	Tenant ACH fee	Screening (applicant)	Main free-plan limit
TurboTenant	Yes	$2	$55	1 bank account, manual import
Avail	Yes	$2.50	$30-$55	Standard lease template only
Innago	Yes	$2 (you can absorb)	$30-$35	Light accounting, no bank sync
Hemlane Starter	No	n/a	$40	No rent, e-sign or late fees
Stessa Essentials	Yes	$2 ($0 into Stessa)	$29-$49 via RentPrep	5 receipt scans, no e-sign

When none of the free tools fit

Free stops making sense in three situations.

You’ve passed about 10 units and tenants complain about fees. RentRedi costs $12 a month billed annually ($144 a year) with no unit limit, and tenant ACH drops to $1. TurboTenant Pro removes tenant ACH entirely for $199 a year up to 10 units, $399 for 11 to 30.

You need real accounting. If you’re heading past 20 units, or your accountant wants double-entry books and bank reconciliation, Buildium’s Essential plan costs $62 a month and stayed at that price up to 40 units on its calculator.

You manage property for someone else. Owner statements and trust accounting aren’t on any free plan here. That’s a paid-software job from day one.