The Landlord Portal allows you to interact with your landlord clients, giving them relevant information and further binding them in to you.

 

 

Article contents:

Why use Landlord Portal

Have a play with Landlord Portal

Configuring Landlord Portal

Using Landlord Portal

The Landlord Portal Grid

Landlord Portal from the Landlord's Perspective

 

Why use Landlord Portal?

Landlord Portal is a control panel for your landlords.

They gain access either via an email containing a link or via a link on your website. They don't get access unless you give them access.

"Landlords. Let your property through us and get 24/7 access to current status including maintenance and rent"

that's a powerful message, isn't it?

 

Once you give your landlord a login, they will have access to your choice of information and functionality. The full functionality list is:

Choose Property: one portal for a landlord's complete portfolio with you

Summary: property addresses, photos and text

Key Dates - tenancy start, end, inspection dates etc for every tenancy

Calendar - all the dates in a calendar view - landlord can add his own events (away, holiday etc)

Maintenance - list and optionally approve maintenance jobs

Statements - generate a statement for each property or the collective portfolio

Messages - This allows the Landlord to communicate with the Negotiator assigned to their property.  

 

Have a play with Landlord Portal 

Landlord Portal is switched on in your account. Whilst you can and should configure it, you can test it with the default settings now. To do this, find a suitable guinea pig landlord - Ideally one that you've added for testing purposes but if not, a live landlord record in which you've temporarily removed the landlord email address and replaced it with your own. Your test landlord needs at least one property and that property ideally needs a let tenancy.

Go to the Landlord Portal Page tab in the landlord record (shown 1 below) and click the activate button (shown 2 below).

 

This will generate a Landlord Portal welcome email which gets sent to your landlord's email address. You can customise this in Configuration - here's a (non-working) example

 

It contains login details and a link. Follow the link, login and have a look!

 

Configuring Landlord Portal  

Before you repeat the steps above with a real landlord, you should configure Landlord Portal to make sure your branding, message and required options are set up.

To do this, a superuser must go to Tools>configuration>output configuration and choose Landlord Portal Configuration as below:

 

 

The Landlord Portal Configuration allows you to choose what information (which tabs) your Landlords have access to.

 

GENERAL CONFIGURATION

If you are sharing statements with your landlord from the Portal, they will have the option to download their statements as a PDF file.  

 

You need to select a Template to assign by clicking "Click Here to Select".  

 

The Template Type will default to Landlord Finance and it will take you to the Our Letters tab.  Remember you can filter by Format and add a new template from here if necessary.  

Click on the desired template and it will take you back to the below page: 

 

 

Once you are happy with your selected template, click Save General Configuration.  

 

DISPLAY CONFIGURATION

 

1. There are two default themes available for you to use.  These will determine how the Landlord sees the Portal when they log in.  
2. The colours can be changed to suit your branding.  Pressing the "Save Theme" button will save it for you as an "Available Theme".  Make sure you change the name as well.  
3. The Icons down the left hand side are what the Landlord will see and will be able to click into.  These are configured from the box on the right hand side.  
4. Each Icon name can be changed.  You can choose if it shows on the left hand side or not (what the Landlord can see) and you can change the order of the icons by clicking and dragging here.  

Summary - This will show them an overview of all their properties.  

Dates - This will enable the Landlord to view relevant dates against the property.

Calendar - This will allow the Landlord to set when they are available for viewings or contact etc.  

Tenancies - This shows the Landlord the Tenancies that are currently added onto their properties (all statuses).  

Maintenance - This shows the Landlord any Maintenance jobs/issues logged against their properties.  

Statements - If you are using Expert Agent Lettings Finance you will be able to share the Statements with your Landlords.  

Marketing - This will enable the Landlord to view any marketing stats, including Website statistics, Portal statistics marketing activity.  

Messages - This allows the Landlord to communicate with the Negotiator assigned to their property.  

Log Out – This logs the Landlord out of the Landlord Portal.  

5. Once you have changed the names of any of the icons and changed the order, make sure you click "Update Sort Order".  

 

WELCOME E-MAIL Configuration

 

Anything in the square brackets is a merge code that will automatically pull information in.  Please do not remove these.  

1. Once you have changed the default text, you can save it here.  

 

N.B. There is no save button as you are saving as you go along so you can just close this screen once you are happy.  

 

Using Landlord Portal 

This important thing is that no landlords have access to Landlord Portal unless you grant that access.

There are 2 ways of doing this. 

The simplest way is to just open up a landlord record that has one or more property, click on the landlord page tab and click the Activate option as shown below 

 

 

As soon as you click activate, the Landlord's welcome email gets sent - this gives the landlord login details.

The landlord portal tab content then changes to show the information below:

 

You can see the username and whether the landlord has logged in and changed the temporary password to a permanent one.

Default Property: used to set the one you want the landlord to look at first. So, if the landlord has a small portfolio and all are let satisfactorily except one that you are just tying a deal up on, make that the default property because it is the one the landlord will have most interest in.

Last Login: shows when your landlord last accessed his Landlord portal (if at all)

Total Logins: you can probably guess this one!

Landlord Portal Enabled: Remove the tick to switch off your landlord's access to the Landlord Portal. If your landlord tries to gain access, he will see a message explaining that he should contact you.

Reset Password: Clicking this, sends the landlord an email with an option to do a password change.

Once Activated you can then choose what this Landlord will see and the order in which the items appear using the options on the write. This overwrites the Configuration settings just for this landlord.  For example, You might choose to use this to turn off the marketing stats when a landlord's portfolio is fully let.

Landlord Portal Overview Grid 

The Landlord Portal Overview Grid under landlords is a new grid that gives you an overview of which Landlords have been offered access to Landlord Portal 

 

To access, hover over Landlords in the top menu and select Landlord Portal Overview.  

 

1. As this is a standard grid you have the Tooltip in the top, (you can choose how this behaves from Tooltip behaviour in Staff Profile - see Personalising your Staff Profile

2. The main body of the grid showing you 10 records to a page, unless you have changed how many records appear in your grid - see Personalising your Staff Profile

3. The Action Menu - this is accessed via the Right Click on your mouse, or the white list icon in the top right hand corner.  

 

The middle and the right hand section of the Tool Tip act a little different than standard grid.  

 

1. If you have multiple branches, clicking into this box will allow you choose which branch you are filtering on.  

 

2. Total Landlords: This will show you how many Landlords you have across your selected branches.  The pie chart opposite shows you the split across the branches.  

 

3. Landlord Portal Activates: This shows the number of NEW Landlord Portal Activated (sent) - the pie chart shows the split across the branches.  

 

4. Awaiting Activation: This shows the number of Landlords across the branches that have yet to be sent the Landlord Portal email (by clicking activate on the Landlord Portal tab of the Landlord Record) - the pie chart shows the split across the branches.  

 

5. Disabled: You can disable the Landlord Portal Account from the Landlord Portal tab of the Landlord Record, or by Right Clicking on the Grid here (if they are the only Landlord ticked).  This shows the number of disabled Landlord Portal Accounts. 

 

 

6. Temporary Password: When your Landlord first receives the new Landlord Portal email, they will be issued with a temporary password, which can be changed when they first log in.  This number shows you how many Landlords are still using their temporary password.  As you, the Negotiator, cannot resend the password (only reset it to another temporary one) and the temporary passwords are a jumble of letters and numbers, it is best for your Landlord to change their password something they can easily remember - the pie chart shows the split across the branches.  

 

7: Bespoke Configuration: When you look at your Landlord Portal Configuration you can choose what the Landlords will receive and be able to look at when sending the portal email.  When sending the Landlord Portal email from the Landlord Portal Tab on the Landlord record, you can choose a different configuration for that particular Landlord.  This shows you how many Landlords across your branches have a bespoke configuration (different to what is set in Configuration).  

 

Landlord Portal from the Landlord's Perspective

In the first instance, the Landlord will see the Landlord Portal Invitation email - They click on the Link to login with the username and password provided. 

 

When they first Login it will ask them on the right hand side to change their password and confirm their contact details: 

 They then see the Landlord Portal dashboard as below:

 

THE LANDLORD PORTAL DASHBOARD

 

The Summary Tab 

1. The Summary Tab is the first option on the left hand side from the Dashboard.  When they click on this it will take them to the above page.  

2. Clicking on the three little lines at the top of the page will open up...

3. The Default Property which you can set from the Landlord Portal tab on the Landlord Record.  Clicking on the Property name will open up...

4. The list of the Landlord Properties.  Clicking on either of the properties will show the summary for the Property.  

 

The Dates Tab 

The Dates tab shows them all the relevant dates regarding their properties.  Again they can change property by following steps 2 - 4 above.  

 

The Calendar Tab 

They have the option of Exporting to PDF their calendar from here (it is under the little pop out tab when they hover over Calendar)

Any Viewings, Take On's, Property Inspections, Safety Checks (any appointment associated with their properties) will show here.  They can double click on a date and add an appointment in, maybe their going away for a few days so will not be in communication.  This will create an Event on the Landlord Record Events Tab and will send the Property Negotiator an Internal Quick Message.  (N.B. This will NOT add the appointment into the Diary).  

 

The Tenancies Tab 

 Any Tenancies on their properties will show here with the Tenancy Status.  It will also show the Negotiator contact details as well.  

 

The Maintenance Tab 

Any Maintenance Jobs assigned to their properties will show here as well as their preferred contractors.  They can add their own preferred contractors if they wish.  

 

 The Statements Tab

 On the Statements tab they can select a date range, a property record and a tenancy and then export their Statements to PDF or CSV.  

 

The Marketing Tab 

They can view the marketing stats for their properties from here.  What Portals they are being shown on, and website statistics (if you have an Expert Agent website).  

 

The Messages Tab

 Any Event you add into the Landlord Record using the Event Type of "Log - Visible to Client" will show here for the Landlord.  They can send the Property Negotiator a message from here.  

 

Log Out 

 

N.B. Remember the tabs, and their order, shown here can be configured from Configuration so they may not be the same for your Landlord Portal.