What people complain about in AppFolio
41 reported problems name AppFolio as what the person is currently using. Below is what they said was missing, and what they resorted to instead.
- Complaints
- 41
- Avg severity
- 3.2/5
- Would pay to fix
- 2
- Industries
- 3
What they wish it did
Capabilities people described needing that AppFolio does not give them, taken from the highest-scoring problems first. These are individual accounts written in each person’s own terms, so two entries may describe the same underlying gap in different words.
- Reliable integration software that preserves data fidelity between property management and accounting platforms
- Centralized request hub with automatic contractor assignment and tenant notification
- Scheduled reminders for all follow-up steps
- Automated work order timeline tracking with status change logging and metric calculations
- Pre-built analytics dashboard for property maintenance performance
- Automatic PDF to structured data conversion for property management documents
- Email-to-spreadsheet data extraction for property managers
- Mobile expense capture app that extracts data from receipt photos and syncs to accounting
- Automated collections notice generator with e-filing and mail service integration
- Automated data extraction and formatting from PM software
- Template-based report customization per owner
- Auto-insertion of maintenance photos into reports
- Automated comparable property pulling for reports
- AppFolio lacks flexible cross-unit cost reporting that eliminates manual Excel work.
- Automated COI data extraction and integration with AP payment workflows
- Real-time alert system for vendor insurance lapses before payment approval
- Property management software with built-in screen reader compatibility and high-contrast visual design
- Integrated remote inspection guidance system with live video and annotation capabilities for visually impaired supervisors
- Automated reservation scheduling and waitlist management that replaces manual spreadsheet tracking
- Dedicated maintenance request portal with photo submission
- Centralized photo storage linked to work orders
- Automatic receipt capture and per-unit cost tracking
- Self-service vendor portal for company information management
- Automated data synchronization between vendor profiles and property management systems
- Customizable dashboard builder with cross-property metric aggregation for Appfolio data
What they do instead
The manual processes people built around the gap. A long workaround list is the strongest evidence a problem is real: someone is already paying for it in time. Where several people described the same workaround, it is marked.
- Manually adding expenses to QuickBooks
- screenshots tenant photo and texts plumber
- texts tenant for photo after hours
- forgets to tell tenant about plumber's visit
- requests get buried under other texts
- manually comparing reports, spreadsheets, and timestamps to reconstruct work order timelines
- built a tiny app using vibe coding to track every status change automatically
- re-type data from PDFs and emails into AppFolio/Yardi/Buildium
- re-type data from PDFs and emails into Excel
- Techs text blurred photos of receipts
- Techs lose paper receipts
- PM manually types line items into ledger at end of month
- PM pulls local court notice template, copy-pastes tenant data into Word, prints, and physically mails/posts
- Pulls data out of AppFolio or Yardi and reformats in Excel
- Creates custom one-pager reports for some owners
- Manually adds photos to maintenance lines for certain owners
- Pulls comps manually for owners who request them
- exports data to Excel and manually separates it to analyze costs
- stores COI expiry dates in messy spreadsheets
- manually checks COI PDFs before payment runs
The problems themselves
Highest opportunity score first.
User loses data when syncing QuickBooks with AppFolio, forcing them to manually re-enter expenses.
4HighProperty ManagementAccounting & Financial ManagementSyncBridge for PropertyProperty management software companies refuse to serve small-scale property managers with only 40 properties, leaving them without adequate support or contact options.
4HighProperty ManagementGeneral Business ServicesPropertyPilot LiteLandlord with 6 rental units struggles to track tenant requests and maintenance follow-ups, leading to missed communication and costly no-show fees.
4HighProperty ManagementTask ManagementTenantTask ProProperty managers using AppFolio cannot track work order status timelines to measure response times, owner responsiveness, vendor performance, or operational improvements.
4HighProperty ManagementReporting & AnalyticsMaintLog Timeline TrackerProperty managers using AppFolio/Yardi/Buildium still manually re-type data from PDFs and emails into their systems or spreadsheets, wasting time and introducing errors.
3MediumProperty ManagementDocument ManagementDocumentPipe for Property ManagersProperty managers waste significant time on manual data entry for expense ingestion and collections escalation despite using expensive property management software.
4HighProperty ManagementWorkflow ManagementPropFlow AutomateProperty managers spend excessive time manually reformatting data from property management software like AppFolio or Yardi in Excel to create customized, polished owner reports.
4HighProperty ManagementReporting & AnalyticsOwnerReport StudioA first-time property manager of a 45-unit property cannot find affordable, easy-to-use software that handles both leasing and maintenance without expensive onboarding costs.
4HighProperty ManagementSoftware SelectionLeaseMate ProAppFolio's reporting is too rigid, forcing time-consuming manual data manipulation in Excel to analyze costs between units.
4HighProperty ManagementFinancial ManagementUnitCost AnalyzerVendor payments are released even when their Certificates of Insurance (COIs) have expired, creating liability exposure because COI expiry dates are trapped in PDFs or messy spreadsheets and not automatically checked during payment runs.
4HighProperty ManagementCompliance ManagementCOI PayGuard AgentA blind property manager needs accessible property management software with screen reader compatibility, affordable API access, and remote inspection guidance capabilities.
4HighProperty ManagementProperty ManagementAccessiView Property ManagerFractional vacation property owners struggle with fair scheduling and communication because existing HOA software is overkill and expensive.
4HighReal EstateScheduling & BookingFairShare ReservationsSmall property operators lack affordable, easy-to-setup maintenance tracking software, relying on scattered communications and manual record-keeping.
4HighProperty ManagementMaintenance & RepairLandsioVendors cannot update their own company information in AppFolio and must manually contact each property management company individually to request updates.
3MediumProperty ManagementClient ManagementVendorSync ProNew property manager is nervous about choosing the right property management software that will provide a good experience for tenants, landlords, and themselves.
3MediumProperty ManagementSoftware SelectionTenantHub ProAppfolio's built-in dashboards and metrics are insufficient for tracking property-level operational and asset management KPIs.
3MediumProperty ManagementReporting & AnalyticsAppfolio Analytics HubFamily group of commercial real estate owners managing 100 properties, 1,000 tenants, and 80-100 LLCs struggles with fragmented accounting in QuickBooks Desktop and manual CAM reconciliations and rent monitoring in Excel, seeking a modern unified system.
4HighCommercial Real EstateProperty ManagementUnifiedCRE Portfolio PlatformProperty managers with mixed portfolios find that no single platform handles nuanced tenant communication, custom reporting, or complex operations without workarounds.
4HighProperty ManagementProperty ManagementTenantTact PMProperty management company needs to automate workflows but current software (Appfolio) requires expensive upgrade, considering migration to RealPage.
3MediumProperty ManagementWorkflow ManagementAutomateFlow ProSmall property managers are stuck with expensive per-unit pricing from incumbents like Buildium/AppFolio and switching costs prevent them from moving to a more affordable flat-rate platform.
3MediumProperty ManagementProperty ManagementHatchkeep
Read this fairly
These are complaints, and only complaints — nobody posts to say their software worked. A high count mostly reflects how many people use AppFolio at all, so this page is not a quality judgement and should not be read as one. What it is good for is the shape of the gaps: the specific jobs people could not get done, which are the same whether the tool is popular or not.
Folded from: AppFolio, Appfolio, appfolio