Building a rental property business has gained a lot of eyeballs in recent times. But every business niche is getting a new transformation with the trending technology. Most importantly mobile apps; Mobile apps are providing on-demand solutions to almost everything.
This blog is written with the objective to help you understand the important aspects of building a rental Property Business Online.
Most of the new real estate apps or home rental apps development remain within the limits of offering users traditional information and agents with potential customers.
But there are some trends that we can jump to facilitate connections between the parties involved in the home rental apps development market.
Urbanization or, rather, instant gratification is what happens around us, and real estate is no exception nowadays.
We believe that the traditional buying/selling/ leasing sector of the real estate industry can be transformed by connecting supply and demand directly with the help of technology.
One way to do this is by enabling real estate app development showing tours from the customer’s smartphone. Home rental apps can help.
You could be knowing that the real estate market has already matured. Or, we can also say, this industry is heating up.
Speaking of revenue, according to the latest report from Grand View Research, Inc., “The global real estate market is expected to produce an income of USD 4,263.7 billion by 2025.”
Real estate investors must research all the different aspects of real estate investing and rental properties, in order to gain knowledge as much as they can before they risk their money and commit to an investment.
You should analyze the basic concepts such as the types of real estate properties, investment strategies, types of rental properties, the laws and regulations that affect the real estate market, the indicators that are used to predict where the market is headed, and the tax rules that will apply to each property class.
Your next step would be to pick a target niche after doing research. When exploring the different types of rental properties, you will come across two main types that are very common:
- Long-term (traditional) rental properties
- Short-term (Airbnb) rental properties
Both of these types have their own unique advantages and disadvantages, as they function very differently from one another.
One of the major aspects of real estate investing is the methodology used for financing the purchase of an investment property.
Selecting between cash and mortgage for purchasing an investment property is an essential decision when figuring out how to build a rental property business.
Researching about the various types of loans or taking the advice of a financial expert will greatly help you pick the most suitable option for your investment.
Finding the correct investment property to purchase and turn into a rental property is the most difficult and the trickiest stage of investing in rental properties.
To find the right property, you will have to research the different markets (cities and neighborhoods) to find a market that is within your budget, and where rental properties perform well and have a nice rental rate. This also needs a lot of research and time commitment.
Understanding the different metrics and methods of calculating the rate of return on a rental property is very essential when trying to find the right property, also once you’ve found it.
The most important thing to see when it comes to rental properties is the property’s cash flow. In addition to the cash flow, you should also learn about and use metrics that can help you estimate the rate of return that your property will have.
Listed below are some of the home rental applications which are popular:
Founded in 2005, Zillow is a real estate and housing company based in the USA that offers a real estate application, which allows its users, including owners, buyers, sellers, tenants, real estate agents, owners, to find and share information about houses. Real estate, mortgages, and improvements in the home.
Launched in 2015, the US-based apartment rental company, Roomi provides a mobile application that helps users find flexible and affordable living solutions.
The WeLive application is from WeWork (also a US company) that gives users shared workspaces. The housing technology startup offers rental solutions to its users through the mobile application platform.
Let’s get into the features which are essential for your real estate or home rental apps
With this feature, users or tenants can safely pay rent online without problems. This feature of the house rental application offers an easy way for users of the application to connect their bank accounts for ACH (Automated Clearing House) payments. In summary, this function can reduce your worries like remembering to send payments monthly. You may consider that this attribute differs from other home rental applications.
The next function, allows users to obtain on-demand maintenance services, such as plumbers, electricians, or any other maintenance service provider, simply by building a rental property business online.
Therefore, users do not need to contact any other maintenance service provider. Hence, it can save a lot of time.
Users can easily request through the application instead of bothering the owner or soliciting people many times through phone calls. By providing this useful feature, you can save time and money for the users of the application.
Therefore, we can say that it is worth including this function, and you, as a real estate company, can consider it before creating a successful application.
Before developing the home search application, there is another vital feature that is worth considering. You can provide a series of rewards and offers that users can get discounts at nearby gyms, dry cleaners, and vouchers in coffee shops like Starbucks.
To attract more users, this type of function is highly recommended for real estate companies, since you can encourage them to use the application to discover the right house to live in, providing them with additional benefits. This is also an easy way to make your users enjoy themselves.
One of the unique features that new companies should keep in mind is the simplification of paperwork that is usually a big problem for most of us when it comes to finding a department.
Since nobody likes to do a lot of paperwork, like filling out the forms before renting an apartment. However, with a few clicks, users or tenants can resolve the paperwork, such as sending the application, credit check, background check, digital signature of contracts, and administration of leases at no cost, instead of spending a fortune on it.
There is one of the vital characteristics, which allows users to navigate, explore and rent the apartments transparently according to their preferences.
When developing a home rental application, the best thing about this feature is that it simply reduces the requirements of the broker. However, this uncomplicated attribute is worth considering.
Real-time chats allow a constant connection between a client (application) and a server. In this case, the server knows the online/offline status of each user and will make sure that the message is delivered to a participant of a conversation instantly.
Real-time chats are usually implemented with the help of the XMPP protocol. This protocol must be transported over the network through a transport link, such as TCP / IP (used with native clients on devices), HTTP, or WebSockets.
Cloud storage means storing your essential documents and files online. You can keep physical copies, but having backup copies online makes it much easier to stay organized.
Additionally, cloud storage gives you peace of mind – as your documents are stored safely, regardless of what happens to the physical copies.
Here are a few ways in which you can use online marketing to rent out more properties:
- Post your properties on Craigslist, Zillow, and other online listing websites
- Develop a website and use it to market your properties.
- Get active on social media
To market your properties efficiently online, you’ll need high-quality images and videos. Try these editing apps to make your pictures look even better:
- A Color Story
- VSCOCam
- Magisto Video Editor
Listed below are a few project management options to consider:
- Basecamp
- Asana
- Google Calendar
You should consider accounting software to aid you to stay on track year-round. There are lots of options available, but one great option you could use is Freshbooks, which is cloud accounting software for small business owners.
Freshbooks makes it easy to have a look at your income and expenses at a glance, and that information can help you budget and plan for the future. You may also use Excel spreadsheets and Quickbooks.
Having multiple tenants can be a hassle to collect rent payments in person and travel to the bank to deposit the money. With an online bill pay option, you can simply give tenants login information and enable them to pay their rent through an EFT (electronic funds transfer).
Consider adding helpful gadgets to your properties to attract higher-paying tenants. Here are some examples:
- Remote security cameras
- Smart burglar alarms
There are a series of solutions ready to integrate chats in real-time in an application both open source and payment. Some of them include:
- Socket allows bidirectional communication based on real-time events
- Twilio is a platform that allows integrating telephones, VoIP, and messaging in web, desktop, and mobile software
- Pubnub provides global cloud infrastructure and key building blocks for real-time interactivity
- The layer provides powerful real estate APIs and SDKs for developers to create rich communication experiences that include chat, voice, and video messages
- Matrix is an open standard for open, distributed, and real-time communication over IP. The matrix allows you to integrate your own communication infrastructure service in real-time into your ecosystem
- The actor is an open-source messaging system with rich mobile and web clients that can handle millions of simultaneous users. It uses its own protocol for communication between the server and the clients
Real-time messaging is the best option for real estate applications since it allows a more personalized user experience and a greater capacity for response.
If you have decided to create one of the most promising on-demand home rental applications, you can consider all of these useful features that we have explained above.
In fact, all these features are in demand for home seekers. As we can say, providing such features to discover a new home is not going to be a nightmare for the users of your application.
Applications that support on-demand presentations satisfy the growing interest of consumers for immediate gratification, but also raise a number of concerns for some agents, homeowners, and homebuyers/tenants.
Homeowners do not always want potential buyers to visit their homes at any time and at short notice. However, when it comes to the “rental” market, it’s usually not a problem.
Traditionally, a buyer meets first with an agent in the office to go through an interview and only then they organize a visit.
Applications like Curb Call, however, do not assume that an agent is familiar with a potential buyer and knowing a stranger could be dangerous.
That’s why Curb Call developed a system called Radius. When a real estate agent goes to a sample, he/she can put the corresponding state (“in a sample”).
The application will trace the current location of the agent on a map and display it on the Curb Call control panel of the broker.
If the agent unexpectedly leaves the message, Radius will automatically activate an emergency alert for the agent and for emergency contact.
In addition, the Curb Call application will immediately notify the agent and emergency contact if a real estate agent presses a “Panic” button on the application.
Trust is one of the most important factors in establishing a good reputation for your service. Markets such as eBay, Airbnb, and Etsy created trust through social validation in the form of reviews, recommendations, and ratings.
Uber goes even further with his driver’s background checks, which involve a county, federal, and multi-state criminal checkup. They also incorporate anonymous comments about a trip and drivers’ qualifications.
They also have a Code of Conduct that each driver must comply with. Once a tour of the home is complete, a real estate app idea can offer buyers or tenants various facilities.
They can write how they felt about the friendliness of the agent. Thus, they can help other tenants or buyers to know which brokers to trust and how to navigate the waters.
The development cost of a rental application relies upon the services or features that you need to incorporate in the mobile application. Also, it relies on where the application is being developed. So, considering all the parameters, the application would cost around $20,000. The cost to develop an app for rental business for both platforms- iOS and Android alongside some high-end features, and technologies, including all panels, will cost you around $35,000-$40,000. You can also use an app cost calculator to estimate the exact cost of developing an app for a rental business.
Finding a house for rent is a big headache. However, the search for homes remains a big problem for most homebuyers. Hence Building a rental property business on an app or website is going to be a great idea.
Here we have simplified in terms of considerations.
Do you have a real estate idea of the application in real estate? Do you think that the idea of your application can help people solve their obstacles to hunting at home? If so, we suggest you discuss it with us.
Our dedicated mobile application developers have already developed more than 40 solutions on demand. You can Contact Echoinnovate IT. Being a reliable mobile application development company, we will provide you with the optimal solution.
How much profit should you make on a rental property?
- Automatic rent payment online
- Application maintenance requests
- Rewards and Offers
- Simplify paperwork
- Allows users to browse, view, and rent apartments without intermediaries
- Real-time messaging
Which types of Challenges face in Home Rental Apps Development?
- Owner’s convenience
- Security
- Agent quality
How much does it cost to build a rental property business app?
The cost for building a rental property app depends on several factors such as features implemented, platform, complexity, time is taken to develop an app and many more. Cost may vary depending on these factors.
How much time will it take to develop a rental business app?
It will usually take 3-4 months to successfully develop an app that is ready for public release. Time may vary depending on the complexity of your app and requirements.
