The TenantTech team can activate this feature for your entire company upon request. Once activated at the company level, each account/ property will have security deposit settings available in Account Settings >> Application/ Screening. 


TABLE OF CONTENTS


Feature Overview 


Company admins and compliance teams can now have more control and peace of mind with this option to lock down security deposit values in the lease. This reduces the opportunity for human error or discrepancies because leasing agents will no longer need to manually enter the security deposit when generating the lease. The security deposit will automatically populate into the lease based on the resident(s) screening result status. There is no additional cost to use this feature.


This could be a great option for your company if:

  • You are using the TenantTech online application*
  • You are using a screening company that integrates with TenantTech*
  • Your properties have fixed rate deposits based off of a screening result (as opposed to deposit values by floorplan type or calculated based off rent amount)
  • You are using a lease provided through TenantTech (such as Multifamily NW forms, TenantTech Attorney-Approved State Forms: ID, FL, NC, SC, TX, etc..) rather than your own custom lease.

* There is an extra step involved when using the security deposit feature if you are not also using the TenantTech online application and/or a screening integration.



Getting Started


Feature Activation

There is no additional cost to use this feature. A Company Admin level user must submit a request to TenantTech support to activate this feature. Once we've turned this on for your company, you will need to follow the security deposit settings configuration steps. 


Configure Security Deposit Settings

A user with the correct permissions (typically Company Admin or Portfolio Manager) must complete this step.

After you receive confirmation of Company level activation from the TenantTech support team, you can turn this feature on at an account level. 

  1. Go to an Account/ Property you want to set up 
  2. Then to Account Settings >> Application/ Screening tab
  3. Under Security Deposits section, Select the "yes" radio button to Use Security Deposit Settings to autofill security deposit on lease
  4. After selecting yes, the Standard, Conditional High, Conditional Low options will appear. You can enter your property's designated security deposit value for each screening result type. ONLY use the FIXED AMOUNT option. The "Calculated from rent" only functions with specific PMS integrations at this time. 
  5. Be sure to save once you've completed the steps above. 




How it works

For the most part, you will continue with your normal workflow while using this security deposit feature. You will notice the difference when you are on the lease generation step. If you are only using TenantTech's Residents & Forms, not the Applicants module, then there will be a new step involved when using this feature. 


Applicants & Screening Status

The security deposit feature will be referencing the most recent screening status for an applicant or applicant group prior to converting to resident (or incoming resident).


If you ARE using the TenantTech Applicants module (online application or creating an application manually) but NOT using an integrated screening company, then you must set the screening status. Select an applicant or grouped applicants and click on the "change status" button. Be sure to set the screening status, not just the Lifecycle or Payment status. 



If you are NOT using the TenantTech Applicants module, you can skip to the Special Scenarios. 



Residents & Generating a Lease

The "Move into unit" button in TenantTech is essentially what converts an Applicant to a Resident (or incoming Resident).


After moving the resident(s) into a unit and while still selected on the resident, go to Forms & Docs >> Print for Single Unit. Select the lease packet or desired forms and go to Edit. 


While proceeding through the Edit process, you will notice the security deposit is greyed out with no ability to edit. This is intentional and one of the main highlights of this feature to lock down the security deposit value. The security deposit amount displayed on the lease should reflect the amount designated in the Account Settings for the screening status associated with the resident(s). 





Special Scenarios 


Resident was never an applicant in TenantTech

There are a few cases where a resident may never have been an applicant in the TenantTech system. 

For example:

  • Your property does not use the TenantTech Applicants module, so you are adding residents manually
  • This is a new property in TenantTech, so the residents were imported from a rent roll rather than moving in via the TenantTech online application process
  • For whatever reason, you may have imported a resident directly to the unit from an integrated system which bypassed the Applicants module.

When you have a resident disassociated from a screening status, you (or a user class with the appropriate permissions) will need to follow these steps carefully:

  1. Go to Residents and select the resident
  2. Click "View/ Edit All Resident Info" 
  3. Scroll down to the section "Lease/ Rental Agreement Summary"
  4. If the resident is disassociated from a screening result because they were never an applicant in the system, then you should see "Not Set" next to the Screening Result. 
  5. A user with the correct permissions (typically Company Admin) will have the ability to set the screening status for the sake of automatically filling in the security deposit into the lease. Be sure to save after setting this. 



IMPORTANT

  • Setting the screening result from View/Edit All Residents >> Lease/ Rental Agreement Summary only impacts the security deposit autofill to lease feature. This does NOT impact any actual screening result or process. For example, if you were to set or change the screening result from the Residents section and your resident was an applicant at one point in TenantTech, that's NOT going to change their screening status or result in the Applicants section. This will not show up on any screening report or trigger adverse action letters. Changing the screening status in Residents section will simply only affect the security deposit displayed on the lease.
  • If you set or change the screening status from the Residents section, you still need to go generate the lease in order for the deposit value to update on the lease itself. 



Security Deposit Change

If you are needing to override a screening result, please defer to your company policy and steps. Overriding an applicant's screening result in Applicants section is very different than changing the screening result in View/Edit All Resident Info for the security deposit.


If you need to change your overall assigned security deposit values, please refer to the set-up instructions at the beginning of this article. If you have a one-off scenario where you need to edit the security deposit in the lease for a specific resident, you can follow these steps: 


Concessions on Security Deposit

If you are utilizing forms that have a section for incorporating security deposit concessions, you can still input concessions. The concession or adjustment will subtract from the security deposit that is locked down from the security deposit autofill feature. 


On the contrary, if you notice that a security deposit differs from your security deposit settings, you may want to verify that a concession is not entered. Occasionally users will accidentally enter a rent concession into the security deposit concession field, therefore decreasing the security deposit total.