Much like Henry Ford’s assembly line revolutionized the auto industry, artificial intelligence and automation are revamping the accounting industry.

In Henry Ford’s case, he saw how long it was taking to assemble cars, and found a solution to improve the speed of assembly. With the automation of property accounting, it’s a very similar process.  It takes over some of the most tedious parts of property management, like the minutiae of accounting tasks, and allows property managers to spend more time managing and growing their portfolios.

How does AI Accounting impact Property Management?

When we hear the term “AI” we often think of genius robots that might be plotting our demise, but in reality, it’s an efficient tool that is completely changing the game of accounting automation. We know that when it comes to being a property manager, there is no such thing as downtime. There are always things to be fixed, books to be reconciled, and margins to be improved. When your property accounting systems utilize automation,  you save time, make fewer errors, and you’ll have more visibility into the financial health of your portfolio for making future business decisions. Anything that helps you sneak in an extra nap, is invaluable. Let’s take a look at how AI can do this.

Accounting Automation Saves Time

One of the few things more valuable than money, saving time is important in any business but especially property managers. With bank recons, accounts receivable, and accounts payable rolling on a monthly basis, it can seem never-ending. But when armed with AI technology that automates repetitive tasks, accountants can process all of these things and more at a significantly faster rate. Tasks that would take hours to be done manually before automation existed, can now be done in minutes. This means higher productivity!

Each accountant can take on a higher unit count and management firms can take on more units. It also means that your financial provider can focus on the bigger picture of your business and less on data entry. At Proper, we’ve seen how the right use of our custom-built AI technology can really superpower our accountants which enables us to charge less for our services.

Fewer Errors With Machine Learning

If you could take a math test and know you would get a perfect score, we all would have slept much better during our formative years. With the combination of AI and human touch, the odds of an error are much slimmer. This is in large part thanks to machine learning, which is when a computer can actually learn through experience. Take for example how you learned pans on the stove were hot, you touched it and learned through experience never to do it again. Computer technology can actually learn the exact same way by being exposed to different forms of data. It’s how your email learns what’s spam and what isn’t.

In fact, using machine learning in property accounting can actually help identify potential errors because it has all the previously recorded data. Payments or invoices coming in higher than normal? It can flag that for you. Discrepancies between ledgers and bank statements? It can bring that to an accountant’s attention.

While the accountant still needs to authenticate the work the computer is doing, having an AI-powered program that can accurately and quickly input information and track data is vital.

Make Smarter Business Decisions

We all have way too many decisions to make during the day, starting with if we want to wear our business socks or our party socks (hint: go with the party socks!). But accounting automation can really help make smart financial business decisions easier by giving you visibility into the financial health of your portfolio and enabling you to make smart long-term plans.

When you’re not spending all of your time doing tiresome bank recons, or paying for costly accounting mistakes, property managers can use that time and money to do preventative maintenance. Like waterproofing the roof so there aren’t issues when winter hits or ensuring the building’s ventilation is ready for summer.

Another big thing it does to assist the accountants is by having all the information in one place. They can have all vendors and companies a client works with as well as understand the context and standard operating procedures of each one. This can help see what vendors are worth working with again, are the most cost-effective, and get the job done right the first time. More resources mean more information.

Now that you know how great AI accounting can be, you might be worried that your accountant is actually a robot. But rest assured, accounting still requires a human touch, or if we’re sticking with our automobile metaphor – a human driver. Accounting automation is better thought of as an amazing tool in your accountant’s toolbelt that will save you time, money, and most importantly, allow your property business to grow!

At Proper, we’ve streamlined the art of mixing human touch and automation by combining the most up-to-date proprietary automation technology with our shared knowledge of property accounting. Questions? We love ‘em! Please reach out if you’d like to learn more about our more cost-effective, efficient accounting services for property management.

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