The Detering Company case study illustrates how Carl Detering, owner of a Houston-based building materials business, streamlined the management of his family’s diverse real estate portfolio using STRATAFOLIO. Overseeing approximately 50 leases across 35 properties—including farms, ranches, industrial sites, and a shopping center—Carl sought an efficient solution to organize and oversee these assets. By integrating STRATAFOLIO with QuickBooks, he and his accountant established a centralized system that enhanced lease tracking, financial oversight, and overall operational efficiency, setting the stage for a more organized and profitable future.
Carl Detering owns The Detering Company, a family-run building materials company in Houston, Texas. In addition to that business, he and his family invest in commercial real estate with 35 properties that range from large acreages, farms, and ranches to a shopping center and industrial properties.
In all, there are about 50 leases to manage, and that’s done with a small team. Carl was looking for a better way to organize their real estate investment information, and with an accountant and STRATAFOLIO, he made that happen.
Carl is getting close to retirement, and he knew that storing property information in his head, in disorganized paper files, and in random digital places wasn’t going to make things easy for the future leaders of the business—likely his kids.
“I have two kids in the business,” Carl said. “I won’t always be there, so I needed to set things up to run without me, a big part of which was getting property information documented and organized.”
When he was starting this process, he had a few goals:
“We have a small office and some of our leases were scanned to digital, but things weren’t easy to find,” he said.
They used to use spreadsheets, ledger sheets, and good old fashioned memory to track properties. But that led to missed renewals, late escalations, and uncertainty about payment status.
“We just had to hope we saw the lease escalation at the right time,” Carl said. “With all of our information spread out, it was easy to miss them.”
Carl met with STRATAFOLIO in the middle of 2021 and liked what he saw. “It clicked with what I needed, and we got started quickly,” he said.
The platform is a way for him to help meet the goals he laid out for his information organization project, and he didn’t have to change accounting software or invest in a tool with features he would never use.
He said, “The integration with QuickBooks was a big plus. We were already using that and were relieved to not have to switch.”
In addition to the QuickBooks integration, Carl was impressed with lease reminders and lease escalation notifications. They also plan to invoice through STRATAFOLIO and to start having the property management company use the platform.
The bottom line, according to Carl, is that all of their property information is in one place. No one has to hunt for a lease document or dig through files manually for escalations.
When Carl connected with STRATAFOLIO, his accounting data wasn’t in an ideal format to use the platform to its fullest. We connected him with Carrie Christino at Elm Street Accounting, who’s familiar with STRATAFOLIO and specialized in accounting for real estate investing.
“Carrie is great,” said Carl. “She helped us get QuickBooks set up correctly so we can use everything STRATAFOLIO has to offer. It helped that Carrie was familiar with STRATAFOLIO going in—there are so many ways to set up QuickBooks, and having outside help was important for us.”
Carl and his team are using STRATAFOLIO to help run their real estate investments. He can feel comfortable that the necessary information is out of his head and into the system, making retirement a little bit easier.
He’s seeing the benefits even while he’s still in the business. The team is saving time on rent rolls, escalation calculations, CAM reconciliations, and more. And since multiple people all have access to the same information, no one relies solely on Carl to answer questions—they can look it up in STRATAFOLIO.
Their current system of organization wasn’t working, but Carl knew he didn’t need a complex, expensive, enterprise system. “We have pretty low-maintenance properties,” he said. “We just need to track rents, make sure we get paid, manage renewals, and handle escalations. We needed to upgrade from spreadsheets and paper files, but we didn’t need to spend six-figures on a solution.”
Carl said he’s happy with STRATAFOLIO, and the system is working for his team. When he has a question, he just calls up Carrie or the STRATAFOLIO team—he appreciates having people he knows to reach out to like that.
“It’s working really well for us,” he said.
For more information on The Detering Company, please visit www.detering,com or call 713.869.3761.
C A R L D E T E R I N G
Owner, The Detering Company
Learn how you can keep using QuickBooks and save over 80% of manual effort when using STRATAFOLIO to manage your operations, global finances, assets, and investors. Utilize our two-way connection with QuickBooks to gain one fully integrated system.
Copyright© 2025 STRATAFOLIO, INC.
And, learn why other commercial real estate owners use STRATAFOLIO to increase efficiency and profitability.
Speak to an expert to find out how you can increase efficiency and profitability.
