New to the Tenant File? Here's how to get started...

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The Tenant File system is based upon a few basic principles, which you should be familiar with. First, the Owner is at the top of the hierarchy. You may have any number of Owners in the Unlimited Version and up to 100 Owners in the 100 Unit Version. (In the 100 Unit Version, the Owners, Properties, Units, and Tenants can be grouped in any way, as long as the total number of Rental Units does not exceed 100).

Next in the hierarchy is the Property/Building. Each Owner may have multiple Properties, however, any given Property may have only one primary Owner, but there is room for a secondary Owner.

Lastly, each Property may contain multiple Units and Tenants. For each Unit, you can have two separate Tenant Names and Social Security Numbers, but the first Tenant is always considered the primary Tenant. Each Unit/Tenant combination may be linked to one Property only.

Tenant File Relationships

#1 Single Family Home: in this case, the Property Name and the Rental Unit Address are the same. For every Rental Unit there is a corresponding Tenant. All transactions are posted to the Tenant Ledger and the Unit Ledger.

#2 Owner with Multiple Properties: in this example, the Owner has a Property, which is a single family home, and another Property, which is a duplex. Daily transactions are posted to the Tenant Ledger and the Unit Ledger (for both), but the Duplex may have transactions posted to the Property Ledger if the income or expense belongs to the Property, such as a roof repair to the Duplex. Transactions to and from the Owner, such as Owner Payments may be posted to the Owner Ledger or Property Ledger, depending on whether the Owner wants separate checks per Property (Property Ledger) or one check for all Properties (the Owner Ledger).

#3 Owner with one Property having multiple Units: in this case, like an apartment building, the Owner has a Property, which has multiple Rental Units. Tenant transactions are posted to the Tenant Ledgers, Daily transactions such as Unit repairs go to the Unit Ledgers, Common Area Maintenance and Property repairs go to the Property Ledger, and Owner related transactions can go to either the Owner or Property Ledger as in example #2.

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