Property Manager

Overview

Goal. Get a new Property Manager through the first week in SmartProperty: signing in, understanding what the reserve study shows for each property, confirming the underlying data is accurate, and starting the recurring work of maintenance, projects and reports.

Audience. A Property Manager setting up a Portfolio in SmartProperty for the first time, or taking over properties someone else managed before you.

Each step below covers one task well enough to get you moving, with a link to the article that covers it in full.

Setup

You need the Property Manager role, assigned by whoever manages users for your Portfolio, typically an Account Admin. The role sets which areas of SmartProperty you can open. Property access, set separately, decides which properties you can open them on. Having the role without property access on a given property means you will not see that property at all.

A Property Manager has edit access to reserve studies, components, financial management, projects, maintenance and reports. Without edit access on an area, the controls for adding, changing or saving are not shown there, only the information itself. See What Can Each User Role Do? (Role Permissions Reference) for the complete picture, including what every other role can reach.

Some of what you read below also depends on SmartProperty turning a capability on for your Portfolio or property, including "Maintenance", "Projects" and Atlas Intelligence. If an item you expect in your left navigation is missing, contact SmartProperty before assuming it is a role problem. A handful of screens, including "Components", "Maintenance", "Plans" and "Projects", also depend on the fiscal year selected at the top of the screen, so check that selector before you start any of the steps below.

How-to

Sign in to your account. If you received an invitation email, open it, set a password, and you are signed in. If you already have a SmartProperty account from another property or Portfolio, sign in with that same email and password instead of registering again. If you cannot remember your password, request a reset link from the sign in page rather than guessing. See How do I Register on SmartProperty Portal?, How do I Login to SmartProperty Portal?, and How do I Reset Account Password?.

Confirm your role and which properties you can see. Open the property selector at the top of the screen and check that every property you are responsible for is listed. If one is missing, or an area you expect is not in your left navigation, ask whoever manages users for your Portfolio to check your role and your property access before you go further. See What Can Each User Role Do? (Role Permissions Reference).

Get oriented to what SmartProperty tracks. SmartProperty centers on the Living Reserve Study, a reserve study built to stay current as an Association's components, finances and projects change. Open one of your properties and review its "Dashboard", "Components" and "Plans" together to see how the percent funded figure on the "Dashboard" connects to the components and the funding plan behind it. See What is SmartProperty? and What a reserve study is and what it tells you.

Find your way around settings. A property's own settings, your Portfolio's settings, and your personal profile each live on a separate screen, reached from a different place in the top bar or the left navigation. Locate all three now, before you need to change something under time pressure. See Where to find settings for your property, your Portfolio, and your own account.

Confirm the components on each property are accurate. Components carry the useful life and cost figures your reserve study is built from, so a missing or wrong component changes the numbers your board sees. Add any component you find missing one at a time, or use the CSV import if you have many to load at once. See Add a component to your property and Import components from a CSV file.

Set your financial assumptions for the year. The starting reserve balance, assessment fees and rate assumptions you enter here drive every funding plan built for that fiscal year. Set them before you build or compare funding plans for a property. See Set your financial assumptions.

Schedule the maintenance work you already know about. A maintenance task tracks recurring or one time upkeep separately from reserve study planning, with a start date, a frequency and, optionally, an assignee and a linked component. Create a task for anything already on your calendar for the weeks ahead. See Create a maintenance task.

Start tracking your first capital project. A project follows capital work on a property from the decision to do it through completion, with its own schedule, cost and linked components. Create a project for anything already underway or already approved, even if the details are incomplete. See Create a project.

Produce a report for your board. "Reports" turns your reserve study and financial data into the finished documents your Association relies on, from the "Reserve Analysis Report" to a simple component photo list. Generate whatever your next board meeting needs, then export it as a PDF or a spreadsheet. See Generate and export a report.

Bring your board and colleagues into SmartProperty. Invite each board member or colleague with the role and the property access they need, rather than sharing your own login. They accept by email, set a password, and reach exactly what you selected for them. See Invite a user to SmartProperty.

Ask Atlas a question, if your Portfolio has it. Atlas answers questions about the property selected in the top bar, in plain language, using the reserve data already in SmartProperty. Select the property you mean, then select "Intelligence" in the left menu to try it. See How do I open Atlas Intelligence, and what data does it see?.

Reference

What determines what you can reach

A module appears in your left navigation only when three things line up: your role, your property access for that property, and whether SmartProperty has turned the capability on for your Portfolio or property. Several screens, including "Components", "Maintenance", "Plans" and "Projects", also need the right fiscal year selected at the top of the screen. See What Can Each User Role Do? (Role Permissions Reference) for the full breakdown by role, and Where to find settings for your property, your Portfolio, and your own account for where each setting lives.

Common first week snags

Signing in keeps failing. Request a new password rather than retrying the same one repeatedly. See How do I Reset Account Password?.

A property or a module you expect is missing. Confirm your role and your property access with whoever manages users for your Portfolio before contacting SmartProperty. See What Can Each User Role Do? (Role Permissions Reference).

An invitation you sent never arrives. Resend it from the invitations list, or copy the invitation link and share it another way. See Add a user and choose which properties they can see.

A figure on the "Dashboard" looks out of date after you make a change elsewhere. Refresh the page. See What a reserve study is and what it tells you.

What comes after your first week

Once your properties, components and assumptions are in place, the next recurring task is building and comparing funding plans ahead of your next budget year. See Create and compare funding plans for your next budget year.