The real estate investor has often been seduced by late-night infomercials which promise great wealth with no effort and little investment. The reality is far different.

Aside from the late night telephone calls from tenants reporting the latest emergency, there is routine maintenance that never ends. Advertising, interviewing tenants, and screening tenants all takes time. And then, of course, there is the record keeping.

Many investors consider record keeping to be an unpleasant and time consuming job. It gets done last, or only minimally, or not at all. But the investor who fails to maintain proper records is certainly leaving money on the table, and may find himself in serious trouble. If he is hauled into court and forced to justify himself, proper records are an essential defense.

Beyond that, when it comes time to sell, getting top dollar will require producing comprehensive records of income, expenses, and maintenance over time. Doing this manually is time consuming and painful, and savvy buyers will quickly beat down the price of the seller who cannot show complete records.

Then, of course, at tax time the owner of investment property is going to miss legitimate deductions, if those expenses have not been properly documented.

In the era of computers, investors are seeking software to handle the record keeping chores for them. But everyone is encountering the same two problems. First, commonly available office or accounting software is difficult to configure and very limited when doing the property management job.

Second, there is a lot of software on the market that purports to be property management software, but much of it is grossly limited in terms of its capabilities, or else it is intended for large management companies and is far too expensive and complicated for the private investor. There is only a handful of products on the market which are reasonably priced, fully capable, and yet adequately simple to set up and use, and the typical real estate investor is not a computer expert and has a very difficult time sorting out which is the best or most appropriate package for her.

The most basic and important fact to keep in mind when choosing a package is that the property management software job is a database job. All of the best and most capable property management software packages are based upon a commercial relational database product. If the developer does not employ a commercial database product as part of the package, then he has to write one. Employing a commercial database raises the price of the package, but also greatly enhances its capability. If the developer writes his own database, then in all cases the resulting package will prove to be very limited because this developer is not taking advantage of the thousands of man-years of work that have gone into the development of commercial database packages. The homebrew database will provide only enough capability to run the application, and no more. This will always result in an inflexible and difficult to expand application.

When choosing a software package for property management, the investor should first establish that the package being considered is built on top of a commercial relational database package. All packages that are built in this way prominently feature the fact in their descriptions, and no package should be considered for purchase unless it satisfies this basic requirement. Be aware that some vendors have some version WITH a commercial database product included, and some versions WITHOUT a commercial database product included. Don't be fooled!

Beyond the need for a commercial database, the feature set of the application becomes critically important.

Software for property management should, at a minimum, track income and expenses by building and unit, of course, but should also track information pertaining to tenants and vendors. An integrated work order capability is a very useful feature for tracking maintenance and for linking maintenance activities to specific expense records.

It is important that the software not only provide a wide number of useful built-in reports, but also gives you the capability to generate your own reports. The software should be expandable to accommodate the changing needs of a growing business.

The software package should facilitate your tenant screening - a very important activity that is often overlooked by the novice investor - and should certainly generate acceptance/rejection letters and leases for applicants that have been screened.

A "nice to have" is credit card processing built into the software. This enables the investor to totally automate the collection of rent for those tenants who will sign up for it (most will, presuming they have a credit card).

The investor who owns commercial properties should pay attention to the commercial property capability of the package under consideration. Does it support base cost/stop loss? Does it support CAM? Percentage of retail sales? Automatic escalators? Percent of CPI (or other index) escalators?

Bank account and check writing support is also desirable for any investor but the very smallest.

Now the investor needs to consider support. This software package will prove to be fairly complex, no matter how well it is written, and the investor needs to consider how he'll proceed if he gets into trouble. Is on site support available if required? Are support contracts available (though typically the small investor won't want to pay for this)? Does the phone get answered when the company is called, or alternatively, does the vendor call back if you leave a message? What are the support policies?

Only after the investor is satisfied that all the relevant requirements are satisfied should the investor look at the cost of the software. Many investors start by looking at the cost, and this is a fundamental error. After all, if you buy it and it does not do your job, then it was not cheap no matter what you paid. Conversely, if it nicely does your job, then it frees your time while improving your performance and therefore it was not too expensive.

The investor who follows this road map will wind up choosing a product that will provide excellent service for years.

More info on your stop foreclosure information search:

Get Free Foreclosure Advice and Free Refinance Quotes
Get your free on-line foreclosure refinance quote and free advice from foreclosure mitigation specialist in minutes. Compare real offers from top national subprime and hard money lenders... more...

What the Mortgage Forgiveness Debt Relief Act Means For You
On December 20, President Bush signed a law that is meant to help homeowners who are facing foreclosure or who sell their homes in a short sale. Before this law, the Mortgage Forgiveness Debt Relief Act of 2007, if your bank or lender forgave a portion of your mortgage debt because the value of ... more...

3 Powerful Techniques Of Using Handwriting In Your Foreclosure Marketing
We live in a day of technology. There is no question about that. Everywhere you look, we have become "computerized". I should know. I have been in the tech industry for over 15 years creating computer software products. Even though I love technology, automation and printing everything out and ... more...

How Do I Stop Foreclosure' 5 Easy Steps
How do I stop foreclosure is a question that is becoming more and more common among homeowners with large house notes. Homeowners with adjustable rate mortgages are the hardest ones hit in the latest round of interest rate increases. Did you know the most common reason for losing your home is ... more...

Huntsville Alabama Mortgage - Good Credit, Bad Credit
In a large part, Huntsville Alabama real estate market has weathered the mortgage foreclosures storms that are now raking and riving the nation. Even in other parts of Alabama, like in Jefferson County, whose financial center is Birmingham, the situation is dire. The county is now considering on ... more...