Onsite Team Efficiencies

Evidence and data. Interviewees said that Entrata’s unified, all-in-one operating system dramatically improved the day-to-day productivity of their on-site property teams by automating manual tasks, reducing platform switching, and unifying workflows across leasing, maintenance, rent collection, and resident communication. Interviewees cited time savings, fewer errors, and greater visibility, all of which enabled staff to shift their focus from administrative work to resident service.

Leasing And Renewals

Entrata’s leasing and screening products allowed leasing agents to handle applications, screening, and lease execution in one system, eliminating the need for multiple platforms. This reduced redundant data entry, improved accuracy, and accelerated the lead-to-lease cycle.

• The regional manager at a real estate organization shared, “We can process renewals in minutes, not hours, and everything is tracked, signed, and archived automatically.”

• When prospects submitted their information online, they could complete the full leasing process — from application to lease — in as little as 20 minutes. A VP of operations and systems in the real estate industry estimated Entrata saved 30 minutes per lease, which translated into substantial time savings across high-volume student housing properties that completed eight to 60 leases per week.

• Renewals also saw major gains. The same interviewee shared: “If 10% of the residents were up for renewal, it could take more than half a day to get it all figured out. With Entrata, it takes less than 1 hour.”

Maintenance And Work Order Management

Entrata’s Facilities app and smart workflows improved how staff received, tracked, and completed maintenance requests. Technicians could update tickets in real time from the field, reducing delays, duplication, and lost work orders. Interviewees cited up to a 25% reduction in average close time for maintenance tickets, resulting in faster resolution and fewer resident complaints.

• The regional manager at a real estate organization explained: “Our staff is able to close and open work orders on the spot as they finish their tasks. Before, they had to go back to the office, go through all the work orders, and put notes.”

• The senior director at a property management organization added: “Now that work orders are mobile, we don’t have to chase technicians for updates. Residents get notified instantly.”

Resident Communications And Dashboards

Mass communication templates and built-in CRM dashboards helped staff send targeted updates and track lead engagement in real time. Managers could prioritize outreach and spot performance issues without needing to pull reports.

• The president at a real estate organization shared: “The dashboard is helpful for prioritizing leads and understanding next steps. Managers can now monitor whether leads are being processed without pulling a report.”

• Entrata’s marketing integrations, especially the website connection, significantly improved accuracy and responsiveness. The regional manager at a real estate organization noted: “Being able to put a special we have in Entrata and having it match on the website and across websites is amazing. Previously, price and availability updates were delayed due to manual coordination with marketing departments, sometimes resulting in lost leads.”

Rent Collection And Payment Processing

Entrata’s ResidentPay enabled flexible payment options (e.g., ACH, credit card, recurring) while autoreminders and late-fee automation improved collection rates and reduced delinquencies. The regional manager at a real estate organization explained, “With recurring payments and autofees set up, collections basically run themselves.”
Interviewees observed a 10% to 15% increase in on-time rent payments and reduced foot traffic in leasing offices due to more residents paying online.

Document Handling, Reporting, And Auditability

Entrata also helped site teams minimize data entry errors and stay compliant with housing regulations. Audit tools, standardized workflows, and digital lease execution made document management easier and more accurate.
The VP of operations and systems at a real estate organization explained: “The property manager can click to email a group, automatically drop a templated email, and send out individual emails in seconds. Before, it would take hours just to build the list and emails.”

Modeling and assumptions. For the composite organization, Forrester assumes the following:

• The composite onboards 500 onsite FTEs onto Entrata by Year 3.

• The blended fully burdened annual salary of an onsite FTE is $55,000.

• Site team members see a 10% improvement in efficiency after deploying Entrata for property management.

Risks. Onsite team efficiencies may vary depending on the following:

• The total number of properties and onsite personnel the Entrata platform affects.

• The maturity of site team workflows prior to implementing Entrata.

• The salaries of affected FTEs.

• The productivity recapture rate (e.g., individual employees may apply additional time savings toward professional development, training, and work-life activities).

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 15%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $5.2 million.

Corporate Team Efficiencies

Evidence and data. Entrata’s unified operating system enabled corporate teams to manage property operations at scale by consolidating tools, accelerating financial cycles, and providing real-time oversight across portfolios. Interviewees cited substantial time savings, improved report accuracy, and faster strategic decision-making enabled by Entrata’s centralized and customizable tools.

Consolidation Of Systems And Streamlined Oversight

Before Entrata, corporate teams juggled multiple point solutions with limited customization and little data integration. By replacing more than a dozen third-party tools, Entrata enabled a single login experience with modules that spoke to each other, from accounting to leasing to compliance. This consolidation reduced operational complexity and eliminated data silos, improving productivity for corporate teams.

• The president at a real estate organization shared: “The amount of reporting we can customize and have access to has been amazing. We have uninhibited visibility into everything across our company, which makes understanding the state of our organization much easier.”

• Corporate users also appreciated the ability to oversee site performance from a single dashboard without needing to pull reports or request updates. The regional manager at a real estate organization shared: “I can go in and see which of my sites isn’t processing leads properly, with no need to pull a report. It’s right there on a tab.” Customizable dashboards allowed managers to spot issues in marketing, leasing, or compliance in real time, enabling faster intervention and improved outcomes across departments.

Marketing Optimization

Entrata’s CRM and lead management dashboards allowed corporate marketing teams to monitor performance across sites without relying on manual reporting or local team check-ins. Corporate teams could quickly identify underperforming sites and intervene before issues impacted occupancy or revenue. Centralized campaign controls and website integrations ensured pricing and specials stayed consistent across platforms, reducing errors that previously caused missed leads. These tools enabled corporate teams to track marketing ROI, adjust campaigns in real time, and ensure brand alignment across regions.

Accelerated Reporting And Financial Close Cycles

Entrata Business Intelligence (BI) and Revenue Intelligence gave corporate teams real-time access to operational data. Interviewees described saving more than 20 hours per month on recurring reporting tasks by eliminating manual compilation and spreadsheet-driven processes.
For one real estate organization, the biggest impact was on monthly financial close. Its president said: “Prior to Entrata, we would not get our financial statements until the 25th. Now, we’re able to have them within eight business days.”
This agility helped organizations respond to budget variances, adjust to occupancy shifts, and avoid overspending across departments.

Clearer, More Confident Accounting

Entrata made financial management more proactive and transparent. Staff could flag charge code errors before they hit accounts and run forward-looking reports to predict and address mischarges, resulting in reduced reversals and cleaner books.
The director of property management at a real estate organization shared: “You can now pull reports to see what’s going to charge next month and fix any errors in advance. As a result, we’ve seen significantly fewer reversals and much cleaner accounting.”

Modeling and assumptions. For the composite organization, Forrester assumes the following:

• The composite onboards 100 corporate team FTEs onto Entrata by Year 3.

• The blended fully burdened annual salary for a corporate team FTE is $110,000.

• Corporate team members see a 5% improvement in efficiency after using Entrata for property management.

Risks. Onsite team efficiencies may vary depending on the following:

• The total number of corporate personnel the Entrata platform affects.

• The maturity of corporate team workflows prior to implementing Entrata.

• The salaries of affected FTEs.

• The productivity recapture rate (e.g., individual employees may apply additional time savings toward professional development, training, and work-life activities).

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 15%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $1.0 million.

Property Staff Onboarding Savings

Evidence and data. Before Entrata, onboarding new property staff was often slow and fragmented. Employees had to learn multiple disconnected systems — each with separate training modules, interfaces, and workflows — before they could contribute meaningfully. This delayed time to productivity and diluted training effectiveness. Interviewees noted that by the time employees had to perform tasks independently, they had already forgotten much of what they had learned, leading to repetitive questions, increased support tickets, and heavier reliance on internal help desks.

Entrata’s modern, intuitive operating system simplified the onboarding process by consolidating tools into a single system and reducing the number of interfaces staff had to learn. Compared to legacy systems, interviewees reported that employees could navigate Entrata 50% faster, accelerating ramp-up time.

• Interviewees also cited receiving significant value from Entrata’s LMS, which provides role-based, on-demand training tailored to each job function. This helped employees focus only on what was relevant to their responsibilities, improving engagement and retention. As the director of property management at a real estate organization explained: “Entrata is pretty self-explanatory, and it has a lot of knowledge-based documents that will allow people to go in and search for whatever they need. It’s so much easier than our prior systems; it’s much more colorful. It’s just much more user-friendly all around.”

• The LMS also empowered self-service learning, reducing the volume of follow-up questions and support tickets. The centralized nature of Entrata ensured consistency in training delivery across teams and regions. The COO of a property management organization explained: “The best part is that new hires don’t need to memorize five different systems anymore. With Entrata, everything’s in one place, and if they get stuck, the LMS is there. It’s made onboarding faster and way less overwhelming.”

• IT teams also experienced onboarding efficiencies. User provisioning previously took 50 to 100 steps across disconnected systems, which Entrata reduced to just five steps. The EVP of management services at a real estate organization shared: “It only takes around 10 minutes now, which is significantly shorter than before. The times savings add up when you think about how many people are onboarded in a year.”

Modeling and assumptions. For the composite organization, Forrester assumes the following:

• The composite onboards 250 onsite personnel total from newly built or newly acquired properties over three years. This financial analysis excludes onsite staff on properties already part of the composite organization and being migrated to Entrata.

• It took 30 hours to onboard each onsite staff member in the prior environment.

• When using Entrata, onboarding new members takes 50% less time.

• The blended fully burdened hourly rate for an onsite FTE is $26.

• In the prior environment, onsite staff would spend 10 minutes provisioning a new user.

• With Entrata, the time spent provisioning new users decreases by 80%.

• The fully burdened hourly rate for an IT FTE is $48.

Risks. Property staff onboarding savings may vary depending on the following:

• The number of newly built/newly acquired properties on Entrata.

• The time spent onboarding property staff and provisioning users in the prior property management environment.

• The hourly rates of affected FTEs.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 10%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $79,000.

Cost Savings From Retiring Legacy Software

Evidence and data. Interviewees’ organizations realized significant cost savings by retiring multiple third-party software tools and consolidating functionality within Entrata’s unified operating system. Previously, teams relied on a patchwork of solutions for lead generation, leasing, screening, payments, accounting, and resident communication. These disparate tools not only carried individual licensing fees but also required ongoing IT maintenance, workarounds, and API integration charges.

• By adopting Entrata, organizations could retire 10 or more legacy systems and eliminate redundant spend. The president of a real estate organization noted: “We’re no longer paying separately for tools like intercompany accounting or management fee automation. Entrata just does it.”

• The director of property management at a real estate organization shared that Entrata’s real-time website integration replaced the need for separate marketing plug-ins, adding: “We don’t have to worry about broken snippet codes or delays.”

• Many organizations were previously paying per property or per unit fees for siloed systems. The director of property management at a real estate organization explained: “Just having everything inside of Entrata … and the cost-per-unit analysis comparing our previous setup with all of our integrations — Entrata came out as the more economical option while offering more value across the board.”

• Entrata’s open API structure also eliminated recurring integration charges — a common pain point with legacy vendors that charged per connection.

Modeling and assumptions. For the composite organization, Forrester assumes the following:

• When transitioning to Entrata, the composite organization achieves 15% savings on costs associated with Entrata-onboarded properties.

• The total cost avoided considers the portion of the costs outlined in Cost F: Fees to Entrata associated with platform usage fees.

Risks. Cost savings from retiring legacy software may vary depending on the following:

• The scope of Entrata deployment in terms of deployment size and products in use.

• The prices of legacy products.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 10%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $3.3 million.

Increased Profit From A Reduction In Fraud

Evidence and data. As leasing processes became more digital, rental fraud surged, exposing property managers to forged pay stubs, fake IDs, unverifiable income, and payment reversals. Many interviewees’ organizations previously relied on third-party tools or manual processes to flag fraud, but these approaches were slow, fragmented, and error prone as threat actors modernized their approaches.

Interviewees noted that Entrata’s built-in fraud prevention tools significantly improved this workflow. Key tools like ResidentVerify, biometric ID verification, and PreciseID integrations enabled real-time identity and income verification within one platform. Audit trails and workflow approvals helped flag anomalies before teams finalized leases. Leasing teams no longer had to log into separate systems or wait days for third-party verdicts. Instead, the leasing flow had fraud detection embedded.

• The director of property management at a real estate organization emphasized: “Putting Precise ID into play is reducing fraud. You can no longer just get us with fake check stubs; Entrata and its partners are going to flag it.”

• The COO of a property management organization noted the operational simplicity of Entrata: “Now the screening and verification lives within Entrata. I don’t have to sign out of one system to check IDs and background. Everything’s right there. That one-stop shop again.”

In addition, precharge reporting and tighter controls ensured that teams caught errors before they hit the books, which improved financial accuracy and auditability. Across interviewees, several estimated a 20% to 50% reduction in fraud-related move-ins, translating into thousands of dollars of avoided losses per site. Fewer skipped rents, evictions, and legal proceedings helped boost NOI and overall profitability.

Modeling and assumptions. For the composite organization, Forrester assumes the following:

• The composite organization generates $75 million in annual revenue.

• This analysis considers 80% of the composite organization’s housing to be conventional or affordable and affected by fraud.

• The percentage of revenue lost to fraud/delinquency before implementing Entrata was 3%.

• With Entrata, the composite’s loss rate decreases by 10% in Year 1. The loss rate decreases by 40% in Year 3 as it applies Entrata to manage more properties, use of Entrata’s fraud and resident verification tools becomes more widespread, and employees become more comfortable using the solution.

• The composite organization has an operating margin of 18%.

Risks. The increased profit from a reduction in fraud may vary depending on the following:

• The Entrata tools in use and how widespread Entrata use is within an organization’s properties.

• The revenue lost to fraud or delinquency in the previous state.

• An organization’s operating margin.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 10%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $162,000.

Unquantified Benefits

Interviewees mentioned the following additional benefits that their organizations experienced but were not able to quantify:

• Purpose-built solutions for student and affordable housing. Interviewees frequently cited Entrata’s student and affordable housing tools as a meaningful differentiator. One interviewee shared that bulk unit assignments, which previously required manual work in spreadsheets and flashcard sorting, were now automated and streamlined through Entrata’s housing assignment logic and roommate matching tools. For affordable housing, interviewees noted that Entrata’s native compliance and recertification tools helped reduce audit risks, limit missed steps, and better support reporting.

• Improved lead-to-lease rates. Entrata’s marketing and leasing automation tools — such as ProspectPortal, automated lead communication, and integrated websites — streamlined the entire leasing process, enabling employees to respond to leads quickly and efficiently. The VP of operations and systems at a real estate organization said: “The whole workflow is efficient. There’s not necessarily a stopping point where a team member has to jump in.” Eliminating manual steps and integration breaks led to higher lead flow and fewer missed opportunities, with many lease applications completed in as little as 15 minutes without human intervention.
  Unified CRM and lead-tracking functionality also ensured prospects were less likely to slip through the cracks, and the end-to-end leasing workflow — from lead capture to portal access — reduced friction and accelerated cycles, especially in competitive markets. The president at a real estate organization noted: “Our lead flow has increased tremendously compared to what it was. There’s no missed opportunities — everything’s flying. I would estimate that’s a 15% to 20% improvement in the lead-to-lease rate.” 

• Elevated IT efficiency. Because Entrata eliminates the need for custom integrations and brings disparate functions under one umbrella, internal IT teams could shift focus from reactive support to value-added initiatives. With fewer tickets tied to system bugs or sync issues, IT team members could reclaim time previously spent coordinating across multiple vendors.

• Better provider support. Interviewees consistently described Entrata as a highly responsive, transparent, and collaborative partner, which set it apart from their previous vendors. They praised the Entrata team for being readily available, listening to client feedback, and proactively supporting them through every stage of implementation and ongoing operations. As the VP of operations and systems at a real estate organization noted: “Our sales rep, our national sales rep, our direct sales rep, our customer support, CSM, manager, everybody that we’ve encountered along the way … they’ve been nothing but great to work with. We’ve really been able to connect on a good level with those folks. They always seem to be available for us when we need them.”
  Clients highlighted that Entrata’s support model was not only about troubleshooting but also about collaboration and continuous improvement. The director of property management at a real estate organization described the Entrata migration team as “very responsive, helpful, and always available” by ensuring smooth transitions and ongoing support as the platform introduced new features. Interviewees emphasized that Entrata was open about its roadmap, receptive to feedback, and genuinely acted on clients’ enhancement ideas.

• More informed, faster business decisions. Entrata’s single platform and unified data architecture gave interviewees’ organizations real-time access to property, leasing, and financial data across their entire portfolio, eliminating silos that previously hampered decision-making. This integration, along with Entrata’s open API, enabled customers to extract, analyze, and visualize data using built-in tools and third-party BI platforms, empowering teams to move from static reports to customizable dashboards and actionable insights. As the VP of operations and systems at a real estate organization noted, “Now we have control over our data with AI and BI, and we can start doing things that we’ve wanted to do for a while but couldn’t because we were held back by our software. So that for me is a huge win.”
  With Entrata, corporate teams could better inform leadership, support asset managers, and drive strategic decisions without needing specialized data staff or manual updates. The platform’s flexibility allowed interviewees’ organizations to integrate their own tools directly with Entrata’s data pipeline, streamlining workflows and eliminating the need to chase down information from multiple sources. As the COO of a property management organization put it, “We’re pulling rates, availability, and performance data directly into Power BI dashboards — no more manually updating spreadsheets or chasing community managers for answers.”

Flexibility

The value of flexibility is unique to each customer. There are multiple scenarios in which a customer might implement Entrata and later realize additional uses and business opportunities, including:

• Continuing to scale their property footprint. Entrata provided a foundation that could grow with an organization’s evolving needs. Interviewees cited aggressive unit growth targets — such as reaching 20,000 units from 11,000 units by 2031 — and noted that Entrata’s centralized architecture and open integrations made those ambitions feasible. The president at a real estate organization explained: “We wouldn’t have the opportunity to reach our expansion goals in the old system. With Entrata, adding properties is easier and more efficient; we’re no longer reinventing the wheel every time.”
  Interviewees also referenced how Entrata allowed them to scale their portfolio without adding headcount. By standardizing processes across properties, teams could absorb new acquisitions faster and with less friction.

• Unlocking value from additional features over time. Entrata’s integrated ecosystem made it easy for organizations to phase in new functionality as their needs evolved, without having to vet new vendors or worry about integrations. Even interviewees who had only adopted core modules like accounting, leasing, and CRM expressed interest in exploring additional tools, such as Entrata’s utility billing. In several cases, interviewees said they were actively piloting or budgeting for new modules to further consolidate and simplify their tech stacks.

• Investing in AI. While most interviewees’ organizations had not yet fully implemented Entrata’s advanced AI capabilities — such as Leasing AI, Payments AI, Renewals AI, and Maintenance AI within ELI+ (Entrata Leasing Intelligence Plus, Entrata’s integrated suite of AI-powered tools) — they expressed strong interest in using them to unlock new efficiencies and business opportunities. Survey results echoed this demand: 60% of renters would find it helpful to have a virtual AI tour option available at any time, and 48% said they’d likely complete the entire leasing process online if guided by an AI assistant.
  Many organizations were already taking advantage of some AI and automation tools. For example, several interviewees said their teams were experimenting with automation for triggered communications and automatching for roommates, viewing these as practical steppingstones toward broader AI integration. Others specifically mentioned using AI-powered agents to handle routine resident inquiries, automate rent payment reminders, and schedule maintenance requests, freeing up staff to focus on higher-value tasks. The COO of a property management organization explained, “We started using the ELI Essentials feature when it was released, and I think that is one of the biggest pieces that has helped our sites — being able to click that button, give it a little comment on what you’re trying to write, and having it create that email for you is amazing.”
  Looking ahead, interviewees also expressed interest in using predictive maintenance to proactively address property issues and in leveraging AI-driven analytics to optimize pricing and marketing strategies. Many were eager to offload more back-end tasks — such as bank reconciliations, maintenance coordination, and appointment scheduling — as Entrata’s AI capabilities expand. This phased approach, supported by Entrata’s unified data and open API ecosystem, gave interviewees confidence that they could easily activate new features and unlock new efficiencies as their business needs grew. As the president of a real estate company put it: “As they continue to build the AI out in ELI+, I think the sky’s the limit. We will be able to fine-tune correspondence, maintenance functions, and finance functions, among others. Overall, I think there are a lot of back-end workflows we will be able to offload. Excited to see where Entrata takes us.”

Flexibility would also be quantified when evaluated as part of a specific project (described in more detail in Appendix A).