General Ledger and Property Performance Reports in AppFolio
In this article, we'll discuss the General Ledger and Property Performance reports, two extremely helpful tools in AppFolio. With a few tips, you'll become an expert at both of these reports in no time!
General Ledger Report
The General Ledger is our personal favorite report in AppFolio! There are so many ways you can customize it, making it useful in multiple situations. For example, if you want to see who created what on any given day then you would customize the report as follows:
- Properties: Blank (or you can choose a specific property if you'd like)
- Show All Properties (drop down menu)
- GL Accounts: All (checkbox)
- Date Range: Up to you!
- Last Edited Range: Nothing
- Check "Show Reversed Transactions"
- Under "Columns", check Created At, Last Edited At
- Finally, for "Grouping" > "Group rows by category:" > "Created By"
Boom! Now you've got a report that you can use to track what was created and by whom! This report is a good way to check that there are no duplicated transactions if multiple people in the office have similar duties. Also, if one of your reports in a previous month changes, you can see who recently created something in that period and discuss the new item with them!
General Ledger for Adjusted Cash Balance Issues
Generally, the Adjusted Cash Balance section on the bank reconciliation page is confusing to most AppFolio users. When it gets thrown off, it's hard to know where to start looking.
We use the General Ledger as a troubleshooting tool to figure out what is causing the out of balance. The customization for this is as follows:
- Properties: Blank
- Show All Properties (drop down menu)
- GL Accounts: Cash Account associated with the bank
- Date Range: All Time
- Last Edited Range: The date of the last reconciliation (check the Audit Log on the Bank Account page for the date and time stamp) through today
- Check "Show Reversed Transactions"
- Under "Columns", check Created At, Last Edited At
- Run the report
- Now, click the "Last Edited At" column to bring the most recently edited items to the top
You want to look for any prior month items that have been reversed or edited. These are red flags, and you will need compare those items to the saved reconciliation report to see if the item was uncleared as of the last reconciliation.
If it was uncleared, and it was reversed, it's fine. If it was cleared, then it needs to be re-entered the exact way it was before and re-reconciled (select "Mark as Reconciled" under "Tasks" on the new transaction).
Let us know if you have more questions on this report by leaving a comment or emailing info@apmhelp.com!
Property Performance Report
The Property Performance Report is a highly underestimated report. Fair warning, what we are about to tell you does involve an export to Excel (yeah, we know) but we promise it's painless!
Every month, we get the same question from at least one client "How do I double check my management fees?". First off, in almost all cases, AppFolio's calculation is accurate and you can trust it. However, if you are still skeptical, you can double check with these report customizations:
- Properties: Blank
- Show All Properties
- GL Accounts: None (to start), now select all of the GL accounts that are set as Additional Fees, or subject to management fees. You can check these by running a Chart of Accounts report and an Additional Fees report.
- Date Range: The month you are checking management fees for
- Columns: Add "Management Fee %"
- No Grouping
- Run the report, and organize the columns so that the GL accounts subject to management fees are before the Management Fee % column and all additional fees are after the % column
- Actions > Export as Excel (or CSV)
- In Excel, add a column to the right of the "%" column. Then, create a formula that multiplies the sum of the GL accounts subject to management fees times the percentage. If you use flat fees, then the formula would be equal to the % column.
- Now, create a column to the right of the Additional Fees and SUM all of the columns. If you don't collect 100% of an additional fee, that needs to be calculated separately, so move the column over next to the SUM column and do another calculation for that.
- Note: Remove any vacant properties from this spreadsheet (you can check this using the Unit Vacancy Detail)
Lastly, use the SUM formula to total up all of the calculated management fees and additional fees at the bottom to see what should have been collected versus what AppFolio is calculating. If you see a difference, you can compare the report to the calculated management fees in AppFolio!
Reports of All Sorts!
Did you learn anything new? Let us know! As shown above, there are numerous ways to customize reports in AppFolio. The General Ledger and Property Performance Report can be used in other instances than what we listed above as well.
If you've been on the hunt for a specific report, let us know by leaving a comment or reaching out to us on Facebook. For all other accounting needs, please contact us at www.apmhelp.com to get started!
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