Landlord spreadsheet or property software: how to choose

Most small landlords start with a notebook, then a spreadsheet, and sooner or later ask whether they should pay for software. The honest answer depends on how many units you have, who else needs to see the numbers, and what you want the tool to do for you.

What you need to record

Whatever you use, a rental business needs the same few records.

• Rent due and rent received, by tenant and by month, with the date it actually arrived.
• Arrears and late fees, kept apart from rent so each stays accurate.
• Expenses, with a category, a date and a receipt you can find again.
• Repairs and maintenance, with how long each job stayed open.
• Leases, especially the end dates.
• Deposits, held separately from your own money in whatever way your country requires.

Two rules from IRS Publication 527 show why the detail matters. First, a security deposit you plan to return is not income when you receive it, but the part you keep because a tenant breaks the lease is income that year. Second, you must keep separate records of repairs and improvements, because you need the cost of improvements when you sell or depreciate the property. If you also use a property yourself, you must divide expenses between rental and personal use. These are US rules; yours may differ, so check your tax authority.

Where a spreadsheet is strong

• You own the file. It sits on your computer or drive. No service can change its price or shut down.
• No subscription. You pay once.
• You can read the formulas. If a figure looks wrong, you can see how it was built.
• It fits odd situations. A shared garage, a room let by the week, a loan on only part of a property: you can add a column.

Where software is stronger

Say this plainly: a spreadsheet cannot do some things.

• Tenant portals where tenants see their balance and send repair requests.
• Online rent collection that takes payments and records them for you.
• Automatic reminders by email or text, without you remembering.
• Several people at once, for example a manager, an accountant and you.
• Support, when something breaks.

How to decide

Moving later is not hard. A good sheet is a clean list of tenants, payments and expenses, and software can usually import lists like that.

The numbers worth watching

You do not need twenty measures. Four are enough for most small landlords.

• Occupancy: the share of months a unit was let. An empty month is usually your biggest cost.
• Rent collected against rent due: the gap is your arrears. Look at it monthly, not yearly.
• Net operating income (NOI): rent received minus the costs of running the property, before mortgage payments.
• Cash flow: what is left after the mortgage and every other payment. This is the number your bank balance shows.

Return measures such as cap rate and cash-on-cash return help you compare properties. They are only as good as the records behind them, so fix the records first.

Mistakes that cost landlords money

• Mixing personal and rental money. One account for the rental business makes every later step easier.
• No receipt for small repairs. Many small jobs add up to a large deduction you cannot prove.
• Treating an improvement as a repair. The two are recorded differently, so label them when you enter them.
• Letting arrears run. A late payment is easiest to settle in the first week.
• Forgetting lease end dates. A flag 60 days ahead leaves time to renew or re-let.

A 30-minute monthly routine

1. Enter all rent received and compare it with rent due.
2. Enter expenses from the month's receipts.
3. Open the repairs log and close what is done.
4. Check which leases end in the next 60 days.
5. Save a copy of the file somewhere other than your computer.

Moving from a notebook to a sheet

1. List every property and tenant with the lease start and end dates.
2. Enter twelve months of rent, expected against received.
3. Enter expenses from receipts, by category.
4. Add a repairs log with the date opened and the date closed.
5. Review once a month: who is late, which lease ends within 60 days, what is still open.

One last test

Ask yourself which job you dread most: chasing rent, finding last year's receipts, or explaining the figures to an accountant. If it is the first, software with online payments may be worth paying for. If it is the other two, a tidy sheet with receipt links solves most of it, and you keep the file.

Tool that fits

The Landlord & Rental Property Manager (Excel, EUR 24, paid once) tracks up to 10 properties. It has a 12-month rent roll comparing expected and received rent per tenant, arrears and late fees, a flag for leases ending within 60 days, an expense log with receipt links, a maintenance log that counts days open, and a per-property profit and loss with NOI, cash flow, cap rate and cash-on-cash return. It works in Excel 2016 and later, Google Sheets and LibreOffice, without macros, and the example data clears in one step.

Questions people ask

Sources

1. IRS, Publication 527, Residential Rental Property (security deposits, repairs and improvements, personal use)

We checked each source on 16 October 2026. If a fact here is out of date, tell us at hello@hiddenway.info.

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