What is a property management system?
A property management system is the single system of record for a rental portfolio: the properties and units, the residents and leases, the maintenance requests and work orders, the rent and invoicing, and the accounting all of it produces. In Scaalr the word system is literal: the lease, the work order, the invoice, and the journal entry are one connected set of records, with an AI agent, Alex, staffing resident email, SMS, and calls on top of the same records.
What's the difference between property management software and Scaalr?
Most property management software organizes the work and waits for people to do it. Scaalr covers that part (properties, leases, work orders, rent, invoicing, and a full double-entry ledger) and then staffs the communication itself: Alex reads every resident email, text, and call as it lands, writes the summary, flags the urgent ones, and can answer in the resident's own language, across 30+ languages. The decisions that cost money stay with you.
Does it work for small rental portfolios?
Yes. Scaalr is free for your first 5 units with up to 3 internal users, on the same records and the same double-entry accounting the bigger tiers run, then $0.99 per unit per month as you grow. Start with one building, run a month of real activity through it, and move to Growth when you want Alex, invoicing, and the front desk.
What is residential property management software?
Residential property management software is one system that holds both the portfolio and the money it generates: properties and units, residents and leases, maintenance requests and the work orders they become, rent, invoicing, and the accounting behind all of it. Scaalr adds a full double-entry ledger and an AI agent, Alex, working resident email, SMS, and calls, so the operational record and the financial record are the same record.
Does Scaalr run the whole operation in one system?
Yes. Properties and units, residents and leases, cases and work orders, the front desk, rent, invoicing, and a full double-entry ledger all run inside Scaalr, so a work order, the invoice it produces, and the journal entry behind that invoice are already connected, with nothing to export and re-key between systems. The two accounts you bring are your own Microsoft work account, for sign-in and resident mail, and your own Stripe account, for card payments.
What does the AI actually do?
Alex works resident email, SMS, and calls. When a resident writes or calls in, Alex writes a plain-language summary on the case, flags urgent issues and notifies the recipients you designate for urgent alerts, and can draft and send the reply in the resident's own language, across 30+ languages provisioned through a connected language service. Alex also writes and updates work-order summaries as messages arrive, and reads photographed shipping labels at the front desk to log a package against the right resident. Email and SMS are Growth and up, with AI enabled; the voice answering service is part of Scale.
Is the accounting real double-entry accounting?
Yes. Chart of accounts, manual and automatic journal entries, recurring entries, fiscal-period locking, year-end close, bank reconciliation, and the full financial statement suite run inside Scaalr, in multiple currencies. Invoices, rent charges, and payments post their own balanced entries, so month end is closer to review than to re-entry. Manual journal entries are still there when you need them.
What is included in each plan?
Starter is free for your first 5 units, then $0.99 per unit per month, with up to 3 internal users; you add a card to start and can cancel anytime. It carries core property, resident, case, and work-order management plus rent collection and the full accounting suite. Growth is $99 a month for the first 50 units, then $1.49 per additional unit, and adds invoicing and online payments, the front desk, Alex, and jurisdiction-aware rent increases. Scale is custom priced, with unlimited internal users, the full audit log, and resident broadcast campaigns.
Can residents pay online?
Yes, through an invoice. Every invoice is emailed with a secure Pay Now link the payer opens without an account, and pays by card, with Apple Pay where available. Money settles into your own connected Stripe account, and Scaalr adds no platform fees; standard card-processing fees still apply and are yours. There is no resident login, no autopay, and no bank-debit collection today.
How do we get our data in?
A guided getting-started checklist walks you through setup, and journal entries and bank statements import from CSV. There is no bulk portfolio import: properties, units, residents, and leases are entered in the app. Start with one building rather than the whole portfolio; that is the shape the $99 Growth plan is sized for. The full procedure, export list included, is in How to Switch Property Management Software Without Losing Your Books.
What still needs a person?
Every dispatch and every dollar. You assign the contractor, approve the spend, set the rent and every increase, and sign what gets served. Alex reads, summarizes, flags, and answers resident email, and the background services handle the recurring work: nightly rent charges, recurring journal entries, overdue notices, and scheduled rent-increase notices. The judgment calls stay yours.