As an owner, your monthly work in STRATAFOLIO falls into two main areas. The first is invoicing management, which covers creating tenant invoices and confirming that payments are posted correctly. The second is property management, which covers responding to alerts, updating loans, tracking maintenance, and keeping your QuickBooks records current.
Staying on top of these tasks each month keeps your Rent Roll accurate, your reporting reliable, and your books current in QuickBooks. It also helps you catch problems, such as a missed rent increase or an overdue balance, before they become bigger issues.
What to Remember as an Owner
- Make sure your QuickBooks account, either QuickBooks Online or QuickBooks Desktop, is connected to STRATAFOLIO and syncing normally.
- If you use QuickBooks Desktop, remember that changes made in STRATAFOLIO only appear in QuickBooks after you run the Web Connector, and changes in QuickBooks only appear in STRATAFOLIO after that same sync.
- Set aside time each month, ideally before the 20th, to complete your invoicing tasks. This gives you a buffer before the next billing period begins.
- Know your user access role, since some tasks, such as posting bills, happen directly in QuickBooks rather than in STRATAFOLIO.
Monthly Invoicing Management
Invoicing management activities help you make sure every tenant is billed correctly and that payments collected are properly recorded. These are the tasks that keep your income reporting accurate.
Create Invoices Before the First of the Month
Every lease should have an invoice created for the upcoming billing period, even if you do not plan to email the invoice to the tenant. Creating the invoice in STRATAFOLIO, which pushes to QuickBooks, gives you a paper trail for Rent and any Additional Charges, and it helps confirm you are billing the correct amount.
- A best practice is to generate invoices before the twentieth of the month, rather than waiting until the last few days.
- Every invoice should have a unique invoice number. STRATAFOLIO assigns these automatically when you create an invoice.
- Creating invoices early also helps you catch a missed rent escalation before you bill the tenant for the wrong amount.
Process
- From the left-side navigation menu, go to Operations and select Rent Collection.
- Select the checkbox of the Lease/s you want to invoice to create invoices across multiple leases at once.
- Confirm the billing period dates match the upcoming month.
- Review the Rent and any Additional Charges pulled onto the invoice.
- Save the invoice as a draft if you need to make changes later, or finalize it if it is ready to sync to QuickBooks.
TIP: If you use Additional Charges for amounts that change every month, enter a one dollar placeholder amount on the lease rate. This keeps the line item visible on draft invoices so you can update it with the correct amount before finalizing. Never set the amount to zero, since a zero amount is dropped from the invoice.
Verify That Payments Are Posted to Invoices
Once tenants pay, you need to confirm those payments are recorded against the correct invoices. This keeps your outstanding balances accurate and your reporting reliable.
- Depending on the grace period in the lease, check whether any invoices still show an outstanding balance after the due date has passed.
- If a payment covers less than the full invoice amount, STRATAFOLIO records it as a partial payment. The invoice stays open for the remaining balance until it is paid in full.
- Payments post in QuickBooks first, and STRATAFOLIO reflects the update shortly after. QuickBooks Online updates automatically, while QuickBooks Desktop requires a Web Connector sync.
Process
- Navigate to the Rent Collection index page to view payment status across all your invoices at once.
- Look for any invoices marked as past due or partially paid.
- If a payment has not been posted yet, post it in QuickBooks against the correct invoice.
- Allow the sync to complete, then confirm the invoice status updates in STRATAFOLIO.
Follow Up on Past Due Balances
If a tenant has not paid by the due date, or by the end of the grace period, follow up promptly. Catching a late payment early keeps your cash flow predictable and gives the tenant time to resolve it before further action is needed.
- Notify the tenant that their payment is past due.
- Create a new invoice if the tenant owes for an additional period.
- Note any late fees according to the terms of the lease.
Monthly Property Management
Property management activities cover the operational side of your portfolio. These tasks help you stay ahead of lease changes, keep your debt information current, track maintenance, and keep your accounting complete.
Follow Up on Alert Emails from STRATAFOLIO
STRATAFOLIO sends alert emails when something needs your attention, such as an unconfirmed lease rate that is about to escalate or a lease approaching its expiration date. Reviewing these alerts each month helps you avoid billing errors and missed renewal windows.
- An Unconfirmed Lease Rate Alert is sent thirty days before a lease escalates when the rate was entered without the Confirmed box checked. This often happens with Consumer Price Index-based increases or unclear escalation terms, where the exact future amount is not yet known.
- Review the lease rate, adjust the amount if needed, and check the Confirmed box before the escalation takes effect and before you invoice the tenant.
- For lease expiration alerts, contact the tenant to discuss renewal or any exercise options in the lease.
Process
- Open the alert email and select the link to go directly to the lease in question.
- Navigate to the Lease Rates tab on the Lease Detail view.
- Select the pencil icon to edit the rate.
- Update the amount if the correct escalation figure is now known.
- Check the Confirmed box and save.
Why This Matters: Adjusting and confirming lease rates before you invoice makes sure you bill the correct amount from the start, rather than needing to correct an invoice after the tenant has already been billed.
Manage Your Loans
Keep your loan records current in STRATAFOLIO so your debt reporting stays accurate. This includes adding new loans when you take on financing and closing out loans when a property sells or a loan is refinanced.
- The Loan Dashboard gives you a centralized view of your organization’s debt, including total outstanding loans, maturing loans, average interest rate, and debt by lender and asset type.
- The Loan Dashboard is read only. It pulls debt information from QuickBooks, so any payments must be recorded in QuickBooks first before they appear here.
- When a loan is mapped correctly, the current loan balance updates automatically as your QuickBooks account updates.
Process
- From the left side navigation panel, go to Finances and then Loans.
- To add a new loan, select the option to create a loan and enter the loan details, including the lender, terms, and any covenant information.
- Map the loan to your QuickBooks account so the balance updates automatically.
- When a loan is paid off, sold, or refinanced, close out the loan so it no longer appears as active.
Add Monthly Maintenance Tasks in Work Orders
Tracking repairs and maintenance keeps a clear record of the work performed on your properties. STRATAFOLIO lets you track work orders at the Entity, Asset, Building, or Tenant level.
- Work Orders can be filtered by status, priority, who the work is assigned to, tenant, and job type, which makes it easy to review open items each month.
- Tenants can also submit work order requests directly, giving you a single place to track every incoming maintenance issue.
Process
- From the left-side navigation menu, go to Operations and then Work Orders.
- Select the option to add a work order.
- Fill out the required fields, including a title, description, priority, and job type.
- Track hours worked, mileage, and any labor or material costs as the work progresses. Note that labor and material cost fields do not feed into QuickBooks.
- Add comments as updates come in so you have a complete, time-stamped record of the work performed.
Post Bills and Accounting Tasks in QuickBooks
Some monthly tasks happen directly in QuickBooks rather than in STRATAFOLIO. Posting your bills and other normal accounting entries keeps your books complete and keeps STRATAFOLIO’s reporting accurate, since STRATAFOLIO reflects the information stored in QuickBooks.
- Post any bills you have received for the month.
- Post mortgage payments by splitting the payment between the principal and interest accounts, according to your loan’s amortization schedule.
- Complete your other normal monthly accounting tasks in QuickBooks so your records stay current.
Reminder: STRATAFOLIO is only as up to date as your QuickBooks account. If a bill or payment has not been posted in QuickBooks, it will not appear correctly in your STRATAFOLIO reporting.
Checklist for Monthly Property Management
- Create invoices before the first of the month
- Verify payments are posted to invoices
- Follow up on past due balances
- Follow up on alert emails from STRATAFOLIO
- Adjust unconfirmed lease rates before invoicing
- Contact tenants about upcoming lease expirations
- Input new loans and close out expired or refinanced loans
- Add monthly maintenance tasks in Work Orders
- Post bills and accounting tasks in QuickBooks
Best Practices for Owners
- Build a consistent monthly routine.
- Handling invoicing and property management tasks in the same order each month makes it easier to spot anything unusual.
- Create invoices even for tenants you do not plan to email.
- Having every invoice on record keeps your paper trail complete.
- Review alert emails as soon as they arrive rather than waiting until month end, especially for lease escalations that need to be reflected before you invoice.
- Keep loan information current so your Loan Dashboard, which lenders and investors may reference, always reflects accurate figures.
- Log maintenance costs in Work Orders even though labor and material costs do not sync to QuickBooks, since this keeps a complete history of work performed.
