Rentcito - For Rent By Owner Made Easy

# Rentcito
## For Rent By Owner Made Easy

### Founder
Andrew Clapp (Founder CPO)

### Period
Oct 2016 - Dec 2017

### Status
LIVE

### Description
Rentcito takes the pain out of renting your investment property with an online service that allows you to list, market, maintain and track your rental property remotely.

### Full Story
Rentcito was created to take the pain out of the process of renting your investment property. We provide an online service that allows you to list, market, maintain and track your rental property remotely. At Rentcito we set out to build easy to use technology that helps you spend less time managing your property and more time focusing on what's important to you. Designed for individual owners who want to manage their rental properties from the comfort of their home.

### Problem Solved
Individual landlords face the frustrating choice between expensive property management fees (8-10%) or spending countless hours managing properties themselves with fragmented, outdated tools. The private rental process is unnecessarily complex and time-consuming.

### Solution
An all-in-one online platform with easy-to-use tools that make it simple for individual owners to manage their rental properties from the comfort of their home. From move-in to move-out, Rentcito handles rent collection, tenant screening, communication, and more - all in one place with a low monthly fee.

### Challenges Addressed
- Property management fees of 8-10% eat into landlord profits
- Fragmented tools force landlords to use multiple disconnected services
- Rent collection is manual, time-consuming, and prone to late payments
- Tenant screening requires navigating complex credit/background check systems
- Communication with renters gets lost across email, phone, and texts
- Finding reliable maintenance vendors is difficult and time-consuming

### Outcomes & Impact
- Managed 50+ properties through the platform
- Processed over $200K in rent collection via secure ACH transfers
- Achieved average response time of under 2 hours for support requests
- Empowered individual landlords to self-manage without expensive property managers
- Reduced vacancy time through integrated marketing tools
- Built curated network of reliable maintenance vendors for quick repairs

### Key Achievements
- Co-Founder and CEO of early stage startup
- Built automated rent collection using state-of-the-art ACH transfers
- Developed tenant screening integration with credit and background checks directly in dashboard
- Created built-in messaging system so landlords never miss a message from renters
- Launched curated vendor network for maintenance and repairs
- Designed multi-device responsive platform for managing on the go

### Features
- Rent Collection - Secure online payment system via ACH to track and receive payments on time
- Background & Credit Checks - Landlords can request and tenants can pull and share through secure system
- Built-in Messaging - Track all communication with renters in one place
- Market Vacancies - Marketing tools to reduce time your rental is on the market
- Curated Vendor Network - Easy connection to find vendors when something needs fixing
- Friendly Support - Access to support network for both landlords and tenants
- Electronic Listings - Digital property listing and marketing
- Stay in Control - Personalized dashboard where you make all decisions and take action

### Tech Stack
Ruby on Rails, PostgreSQL, Stripe, Plaid, Webflow, ACH Integration

### Metrics
- 50+ Properties Managed
- $200K+ Rent Collected
- < 2hrs Avg Response Time

### Key Lessons
- B2B SaaS for fragmented markets requires strong distribution strategy
- Landlords are price-sensitive and compare against DIY alternatives
- Empower users to stay in control - they want tools, not full-service management
- Mobile-friendly is essential - landlords manage properties on the go