Kandise Varvil has deep experience across single-family and multifamily property management as both a PM and a BDR. In 2023 she co-founded PM Pathbuilders, a property management consultancy focused on helping businesses scale efficiently. Kandise lives in Arizona and is a Triple Win Mentor.
Property management moves fast. Every day involves a long list of tasks, deadlines, and tiny details that absolutely matter. When something gets missed, it creates real problems for residents, owners and our team.
This is why the strongest property management companies rely on task management software. They are not leaving their business in the hands of sticky notes or who remembers what. They are organized, accountable, and running with clarity.
At PM Pathbuilders, I spend a lot of time helping companies move from “things live in people’s heads” to “things live in a system.” When your processes live in software, your business becomes easier to run. Your team spends less time chasing information and more time doing meaningful work.
A good task management software can take everyday, manual work and streamline it to save your team time, money, and headaches.
If you are on the cusp of deciding to implement a task management software, it is worth asking:
How many hours are lost to tasks that could happen automatically? How many follow ups, reminders, approvals, and repeat steps are eating up your team’s time?
If your team is spending even one hour a day on something that should already be automated, that’s:
- 5 hours a week
- 20 hours a month
- 260 hours a year
For one person.
Multiply that across your entire team and the number gets expensive very fast.
Task management software is not a tech upgrade. It is the modern foundation of property management.
What is task management software?
Task management software is a digital tool that helps your team track, assign, and complete the recurring work that keeps your business running. It exists to make sure every task gets done on time, by the right person, without anyone guessing what comes next. While the functionality varies—more on that later—the overall goal is the same: increased efficiency, decreased mistakes.
At a basic level, every system starts as a to-do list. Tools like Trello are built around this idea. You write down tasks. You check them off. Simple.
The next level of task management systems goes beyond just a simple checklist, and starts to introduce automation and interactions. Monday.com is a great example of this kind of tool, but there are plenty of them. These systems can trigger actions and hand tasks from one person to another. If one step is complete, the next one appears. If it is not complete, the workflow reacts and adjusts.
The highest level of task management software is built specifically for property managers. Platforms like Aptly and LeadSimple take automation further. They connect directly to your property management software to pull in real data, create accountability, and run your core processes automatically. Renewals, delinquency, onboarding, move outs, inspections, and status changes all become organized and trackable.
The result is simple. Your team does not have to remember the process. The software remembers it for them.
What can task management software do for property managers?
Task management software plays two important roles in a property management company. First, it keeps your team organized and on schedule so tasks are completed on time. It also creates a safety net. If something slips, there is a clear recovery step to get it back on track.
It is also a powerful systemization tool. Instead of every team member doing things their own way, the software ensures a standardized experience for both owners and residents. That protects your brand and delivers consistent service no matter who handles the task.
Task management software also elevates the resident and investor experience. You can build automated touchpoints like renewal reminders and onboarding check-ins that feel high touch and personal, but happen without any extra team effort. Owners receive a higher level of communication and service, and we do not lose time providing it to them.
One of my favorite real examples comes from a company that struggled to track homeowner’s insurance policies. They added policy renewal dates into their task management system and automated follow ups to collect updated declarations before expiration. This protects the business from unnecessary risk and gives the owner a clear, elevated experience.
As a management company becomes more mature, every step in the client lifecycle is supported by a process in the software. Some include resident or owner communication, like renewals. Others do not, like HOA documentation or licensing requirements. Regardless of the workflow, the right platform can automate it and ensure nothing is left to chance.
Key features in task management software
There are a lot of options on the market, and it can feel overwhelming trying to figure out what matters most. For property management companies, these are the three must-have features you should evaluate before making a decision.
Integration with your property management software
Your task management system has to talk to your property management software. Investor names, resident names, addresses, balances, lease expiration dates. All of it needs to sync directly into your workflows.
Why it matters:
- You can automate lease renewals because the system sees upcoming expiration dates.
- You can automate balance owed notifications because the system sees delinquency.
- You eliminate double data entry, which is slow, expensive, and creates mistakes.
Without a real integration, half of your processes will still live outside the tool, which defeats the purpose.
Strong automation capabilities
Not all automation is equal. Some tools automate like a checklist. Others automate like an operations engine.
Ask specific questions:
- Can it send emails or text messages automatically?
- Can it assign tasks to the right person at the right time?
- Can it create calendar events or reminders without someone clicking a button?
- Can it trigger steps based on real data, like payment status or a new move-out notice?
Think about what your business will need over the next two to three years. Not just what you need today.
Ease of use in building out the system
You are not just using the software. You are building your company inside it. That means the system must be practical to set up and maintain.
Consider:
- Will your team be able to build and update workflows themselves?
- Do you want a platform with expert support or consulting help available?
- Do you prefer more flexibility even if it is more complex to configure?
Just like your company, your software will need to evolve. Think about how much your processes have changed in the last ten years. They will keep changing. If the software is not updated regularly, it becomes stale and stops supporting the business the way it should.
In general, the more the software can do, the more thoughtful the setup needs to be. Choose what your team can realistically manage while still keeping the system fresh and relevant over time.
Are you ready for task management software?
Another important question is whether your company is actually ready to add a task management system to your tech stack. The software is powerful, but it will only work if a few things are already true in your business. So… how do you know when you’re ready?
In my opinion, you’re ready for task management software when a few things are true:
- You know who’s responsible for what, and who the backup is for each item. Roles and responsibilities are clear.
- You have clean processes that are relatively systematic, consistent, and ready to be automated.
- You have someone with enough capacity to act as a dedicated project lead for the software.
For example, if you have an owner onboarding process that runs the same way every time, where you add the investor to your PM software, send their onboarding information, confirm their reserve contribution, and send a welcome email, that is something task management software should handle. Once it is mapped and automated, the system carries the weight instead of your people.
Are you willing to let go of control?
You should not only ask what you need from task management software. You have to ask what you are ready for.
Automation requires trust. You need to feel comfortable with the idea that certain tasks will happen without you reviewing every step. You need to be okay with automated text messages and emails being sent at the right moments without you pressing send. You need to be comfortable with workflows automatically scheduling owner review calls or sending reminders when payments are late. These efficiencies move your company forward, but they require letting go of the belief that every communication must pass through your hands to be correct.
Consider the business factors
At the end of the day, like any other investment, this is about determining what’s the right fit for your company. Here are the two biggest business factors to consider:
- Company size: More people on your team can mean more capacity to help with implementation, but it also means more people to train and more habits to shift. Think about how much change your team can realistically absorb.
- Cost: Can your company afford it right now? There is a strong return on investment with task management software because it reduces the time your team spends on routine tasks. However, there is often a sizable upfront investment. If your software is priced per door, the cost will grow as you grow, so make sure that aligns with your long-term plan.
Understanding change management
Even the best software will fail if your team does not use it.
Think about how your team has handled new technology in the past. Will automation feel supportive, or will it feel threatening? Will they embrace it or resist it? Will they default to the old way once things get busy?
Team buy-in is not optional. If you launch a system and no one uses it, you will quickly end up with hundreds of overdue tasks and a team frustrated by the entire experience. Once that happens, adoption becomes even harder in the future.
As you plan an implementation of this scale, ask yourself how you can lighten the load for the team, emphasize ease of use, and introduce the changes step by step. Look at team capacity, team size, and comfort with technology to determine which roles and processes should go first. Start with changes that genuinely make daily work easier, not harder.
Task management is not set it and forget it
One thing that often gets overlooked when teams are evaluating task management software is what it takes to keep it updated over time.
Task management tools need regular attention. Processes change. Roles shift. Communication style evolves. If your software does not evolve with those changes, it stops supporting the business the way it should. In my opinion, the only thing worse than not having a task management system is having one that is outdated. That is when people get frustrated. The system is wrong, so the team works around it instead of with it.
If someone’s role changes, automations must be updated. If your voice or tone changes, the messaging needs a refresh. If a process changes, the workflow should change with it. If your branding changes, email templates should reflect the new look and feel. And if legislation changes, you may need to adjust timelines, notice requirements, and compliance checkpoints. If that does not get updated immediately, it can break the entire workflow and cause real problems.
Maintaining the system takes effort, but it is effort worth investing. When your workflows are aligned with how your company actually operates today, your team saves time. They spend more of their day doing meaningful work instead of recreating checklists. And both investors and residents get a better, more consistent experience from your company.
Topics:
December 5, 2025
