Every APM Help client has passed their trust account audit. Here's how we're structured to make that possible.
Every APM Help client has passed their trust account audit. Here's how we're structured to make that possible.
We've worked with thousands of property management companies across the US. Every single one that has gone through a trust account audit while working with us has passed. That's not a marketing claim. It's the result of a specific structure, and it's worth explaining what that structure actually is.
The first thing that makes it possible is that we only work inside PM software. AppFolio, Buildium, Propertyware, Rentvine, Rent Manager. Not exported to QuickBooks, not managed in a spreadsheet, not reconciled in a third-party tool. The trust account activity lives where it's supposed to live, in the platform the auditor is going to ask you to pull reports from. Our team came out of those platforms. Several of our accountants worked at AppFolio, Buildium, Propertyware, and Rentvine directly before joining us. They know how the systems generate errors, where the diagnostic reports are, and what an auditor will look for when they open your books.
The second thing is daily reconciliations. Not monthly, not weekly. Every bank account, every business day. Bank recs completed daily and guaranteed within five business days of statement end date. The reason this matters for audits is that errors compound. A misposted receipt that sits undetected for 30 days creates downstream problems in owner ledgers, distribution calculations, and the three-way reconciliation. Catching it the same day it happens means it never becomes a pattern, and patterns are what auditors find.
The third thing is separation of duties. The team doing the reconciliations is not the team approving disbursements. That structural separation is something state regulators specifically look for. When one person handles both sides of the trust account, there is no independent check on their work. When two separate teams handle them, errors on either side surface before they compound.
The fourth is what we call Triple Tied Out. Every day we review three things: whether all bank reconciliations are current and correct, whether cash balances cover all tenant liabilities before any disbursements go out, and whether any owner property balances are negative. Negative owner balances are one of the most common findings in state audits. Catching them daily means they get corrected before a distribution goes out, not after an auditor pulls the ledgers.
The fifth is cleanup before recurring work starts. We don't take over a set of books and start doing daily recs on top of a broken foundation. If the books have problems, we run a cleanup project first. Diagnostic to identify every issue, reconstruction to correct each one at the source, reconciliation to close every period with a clean three-way tie-out. Recurring services don't start until the books are clean. That's not an upsell. It's how you make sure the ongoing work actually holds.
When an audit request comes in, the average time for our team to respond and deliver what the auditor needs is three days. That's because the documentation is current, the reconciliations are clean, and the records are organized in a way an auditor can follow. Most audit requests are stressful for PM companies because the books weren't maintained with audit readiness in mind. Ours are.
We're at apmhelp.com if any of this is useful context for where your books currently stand.
Every APM Help client has passed their trust account audit. Here's how we're structured to make that possible.
We've worked with thousands of property management companies across the US. Every single one that has gone through a trust account audit while working with us has passed. That's not a marketing claim. It's the result of a specific structure, and it's worth explaining what that structure actually is.
The first thing that makes it possible is that we only work inside PM software. AppFolio, Buildium, Propertyware, Rentvine, Rent Manager. Not exported to QuickBooks, not managed in a spreadsheet, not reconciled in a third-party tool. The trust account activity lives where it's supposed to live, in the platform the auditor is going to ask you to pull reports from. Our team came out of those platforms. Several of our accountants worked at AppFolio, Buildium, Propertyware, and Rentvine directly before joining us. They know how the systems generate errors, where the diagnostic reports are, and what an auditor will look for when they open your books.
The second thing is daily reconciliations. Not monthly, not weekly. Every bank account, every business day. Bank recs completed daily and guaranteed within five business days of statement end date. The reason this matters for audits is that errors compound. A misposted receipt that sits undetected for 30 days creates downstream problems in owner ledgers, distribution calculations, and the three-way reconciliation. Catching it the same day it happens means it never becomes a pattern, and patterns are what auditors find.
The third thing is separation of duties. The team doing the reconciliations is not the team approving disbursements. That structural separation is something state regulators specifically look for. When one person handles both sides of the trust account, there is no independent check on their work. When two separate teams handle them, errors on either side surface before they compound.
The fourth is what we call Triple Tied Out. Every day we review three things: whether all bank reconciliations are current and correct, whether cash balances cover all tenant liabilities before any disbursements go out, and whether any owner property balances are negative. Negative owner balances are one of the most common findings in state audits. Catching them daily means they get corrected before a distribution goes out, not after an auditor pulls the ledgers.
The fifth is cleanup before recurring work starts. We don't take over a set of books and start doing daily recs on top of a broken foundation. If the books have problems, we run a cleanup project first. Diagnostic to identify every issue, reconstruction to correct each one at the source, reconciliation to close every period with a clean three-way tie-out. Recurring services don't start until the books are clean. That's not an upsell. It's how you make sure the ongoing work actually holds.
When an audit request comes in, the average time for our team to respond and deliver what the auditor needs is three days. That's because the documentation is current, the reconciliations are clean, and the records are organized in a way an auditor can follow. Most audit requests are stressful for PM companies because the books weren't maintained with audit readiness in mind. Ours are.
We're at apmhelp.com if any of this is useful context for where your books currently stand.
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Financial & Books Cleanup
Get your books and financials cleaned up to be 100% audit proof.
Trust Bookkeeping
We keep your trust books clean, tidy, and up to date.
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Don't worry, we also keep your corporate books clean as well!
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