People always ask how we “do it all” with working full time, raising twins and also growing our real estate investing and property management business. Well it’s not easy and the real secret is… what for it… you just have to be organized!
or·gan·ized: having one's affairs in order so as to deal with them efficiently; arranged in a systematic way, especially on a large scale.
One way we stay organized is to use various online tools and apps to do our work efficiently and have ways to measure and monitor progress/success. Whenever we hear someone mention an app they are using I note it down and check it out. I want to make sure our “toolbox” is always optimized!
My top 6 tools I cannot do without are below. As a warning none are free. I’ve always done free trials first when testing new software but I find to really get the most out of the apps you need to dish out some money!
1. Project Management Software:
Things I’ve tried: Trello, asana, jira, cozi, excel
My Favourite: Monday.com
monday.com is a powerful project management system — a complete Work OS designed to help your team complete projects efficiently, collaborate effectively, and grow.
Why we love it:
Monitoring, managing and tracking workloads
Easy communication, collaboration and data visualization
CRM (customer relationship management) capture leads, track pipelines and manage contacts
Delegate tasks and organize to do lists
2. Short-Term Rental Property Management Software:
Things I’ve tried: Excel, Stessa, Hostaway
My favourite: Guesty
Guesty is an affordable all-in-one property management platform where you can manage all your booking channels in one place for short and mid-term rentals.. We have our listings from Airbnb, VRBO and our website all synced.
Why we love it:
Seamless link calendars from various platforms
Syncs with pricelabs for dynamic pricing
Easy to manage cleaning tasks and share turnover schedules with cleaners
Create templates and schedule guest messaging
Automatically sets up Schlage lock keypad codes for guest check-ins
Data visualization
Sign up for Guesty Pros (4+ properties) and get 20% off your onboarding fees using this link!
3. Dynamic Pricing:
Things I’ve tried: airdna, beyond pricing, airbtics
My favourite: Pricelabs.com
PriceLabs allows property managers to track monthly revenue, listing performance and other metrics through real-time reports. The platform offers personalized dashboards to gain insight into supply and demand, overall booking trends and prices.
Why we love it:
Uses different market variables to recommend daily rates (hyper-local data, seasonality, market trends, events and holidays, Airbnb comps and customization options)
Syncs easily with Guesty
Easily monitor pricing of competitors and nearby hotels
Utilizes Airbnb automated dataset and market trends to provide investors with the right information for better decision-making – much better insights than airDNA provides.
Easily build custom dashboards to research new markets at much cheaper rate than other platforms charge
Data visualization
4. Online Design:
Things I’ve used in the past: QuarkXPress, Illustrator, Photoshop, Microsoft Publisher
My Favourite: Canva Pro
Canva is an online design and publishing tool with a mission to empower everyone in the world to design anything and publish anywhere. I’ve been using Canva since 2016 – I use it for everything!
Why we love it:
Access to massive photo, element, video and audio library
Amazing templates
Brand kits and templates
Team collaboration
5. Email Marketing:
Things I’ve tried: mailchimp, convertkit
My Favourite: flodesk
Flodesk is used deliver a consistent experience and stop juggling separate tools for your lead generating activities. From designing emails, newsletters, offers and forms you can do everything in one place and also monitor your growth!
Why we love it:
You can create and send beautiful emails
So easy to use (no need to mess with HTML code!)
Marketing funnels
Great templates and access to gorgeous photos
Makes building your email list fun!
6. Social Media Planning:
Things I’ve tried: loomy, later, preview, excel, canva, meta
My Favourite: Tailwind
Tailwind is a social media marketing solution built specifically for Instagram, Facebook and Pinterest marketing. It unifies your social & email marketing into a single solution, and gives you a marketing plan, so you can grow smarter and faster.
Why we love it:
Schedule and publish content to Instagram, Pinterest and Facebook
Cross posting content on all platforms is super easy
Hashtag recommendations
Save drafts and hashtag groups
Ghostwriting
Overall very easy to use