Keyzapp Blog

6 tools property managers are using to assess BTL property potential

In today's uncertain climate, PMs need to be better than ever at helping landlord clients find the right investments. Lucy reviews some tools to help.

What Tenants Really Expect from Your Holiday Let

The holiday let market is more competitive than ever. Dakota takes a look at some key things you can do to make your let stand out.

The Key to a Safer Pool: Enhancing Compliance and Security

Dakota's short guide explores how facility managers can ensure better all-around swimming pool security and safety.

Signs of Degradation that Might Impact a Building's Security

Building security is about more than keeping the keys safe! Let's dig into one of the biggest risk factors to keep in mind.

Unique Office Checks: How to Prepare for the Unexpected

Dakota explores how to prepare for unforeseen maintenance issues, to mitigate risks, or cope with emergencies effectively.

Keyzapp Now Integrates with Acquaint CRM!

Take your key management beyond your CRM with Keyzapp's new Acquaint Integration

By popular request: Keyzapp integrates with Street

We're delighted to bring our most requested integration in the past 6 months.

Documenting Wear and Tear in a Pet-Friendly Property

In her latest look at the issues leading up to the Renter Rights

Protecting People's Privacy in a Multi-Occupancy Property

Dakota surveys the tricky balance of individual and collective privacy in HMOs.

New Integration: Apex27 & GlueDog come to Keyzapp

Put your Apex 27 key management on steroids, with the help of Keyzapp and GlueDog.

How To Keep Your Smart Home Sustainable And Safe

This article explains how smart home technology can be green and secure to avoid any doubts you may have about making the investment.

How Technology Can Create Strong Contractor Partnerships

A strong partnership with the right contractors is essential in today's competitive property market, especially amid significant legislative

Dealing With Discarded Belongings In Empty Buildings

With people moving in and out of various residential and commercial properties all the time, building managers,

Renovation ROI: Upgrades to Help Estate Agents Secure Higher Rents and Faster Sales

When managing a portfolio of properties, you need quick solutions for homes that won’t sell.

How to Manage Properties During Seasonal Shifts

With the expense of maintaining properties and the rising costs of energy bills, it makes economical and practical sense

How To Manage Property Disputes Smoothly

As a property owner, manager, or agency, dealing with disputes is an inevitable part of the job.

How To Clean Commercial Premises In An Eco-Friendly Way

In today's world, environmental consciousness is more than just a trend; it's a responsibility that extends to every aspect of our lives, including

Why It Is Important To Upgrade And Maintain Your External Buildings

While it is important to carry out ongoing maintenance throughout the year, the arrival of summer is an ideal time

Unique Quirks Of Managing Student Accommodation

Student accommodation is a significant aspect of university life and represents a substantial portion of a student's expenses.

Tips For Promoting Your Buy-To-Let To Prospective Tenants

Owning a buy-to-let property and renting it out can be a great way to generate additional income.

Property Management Priorities: Key Checks In The Colder Months

As the weather turns colder, property managers, agents and landlords in charge of their buildings’ upkeep will shift their focus to a winter

How To Safeguard The Contents Of A Holiday Rental

Staying in holiday rentals is the preferred choice for many keen travellers. Staying in a beautiful property located in a desirable spot can make a

The Pros And Cons Of Smart Locks For Home Security

With smart homes growing in number each year and smart technology becoming more widely available

Digital Tools Streamlining Commercial Property Inspections And Surveying

Commercial property surveys and inspections have remained relatively formulaic for decades

How Might The Renters Reform Bill Impact Lettings Agents?

Initially proposed in 2019, but delayed numerous times, many property professionals believed that

Creating A Low-Maintenance Garden To Boost Your Rental Appeal

It is in your landlord's interests to make your rental property as appealing as possible to potential tenants

Is A Leasehold Property A Good Buy-To-Let Investment?

When investing in a buy-to-let, there are countless considerations to make, but one that often gets overlooked in discussions

Helping Viewers See The Full Picture: How Agents Can Highlight Potential

When your agency or property management company is tasked with selling a home, it often goes one of two ways;

Are Top Floor Flats Harder For Estate Agents To Sell?

The sale of flats and apartments makes up around 1 in 5 homes in the UK (and about half of all property transactions in London)

How To Resolve Tenant-Landlord Disputes Without Going To Court

Every landlord needs to be prepared for a deposit dispute because it’s an inevitability that comes with the job.

What Will Really Matter In The 2023 Property Market?

Buying a home is a huge decision, and one that is obviously going to be influenced by the prevailing economic climate and personal financial situation

5 Steps to Easier End-Of-Tenancies

It is in everyone’s interests to ensure the end of a tenancy is handled as smoothly as possible. Dakota explains the best way to prepare.

How Landlords Can Insulate Their Property In The Most Eco-Friendly Way

Current legislation stipulates that the minimum EPC (Energy Performance Certificate) rating for rental properties in England

6 Ways Landlords Can Keep Properties Secure With A Minimum Spend

Your landlords, have a responsibility to keep your rental properties as safe and secure as possible.

Sustainable Property Maintenance Jobs Agents Shouldn’t Ignore

Property maintenance doesn’t just improve the aesthetic quality of a home, it also helps to retain value, or even significantly increase it.

Snagging Report or Home Survey – Which Option Should Agents Recommend?

A property purchase is a major financial commitment and most residential home buyers are in need of professional help to understand whether the asset

How Landlords Can Tackle Rental Reforms and Energy Changes

The government’s plans for the rental market will see some big changes in the coming years.

Smart Security Tips For Tech-Savvy Property Managers

In today’s day and age of technological advancements, smart properties are becoming more and more popular throughout the UK.

Why Buy-to-Let Purchases are Rising in 2022

Despite the challenges we have faced over the past two years, a surprising outcome of the pandemic

Which Eco-Savvy Techniques Boost Property Values?

With rising energy costs and increasing awareness of the environmental impact of property, home energy efficiency improvements are high on the list

What Changes Will Landlords Be Taking into 2022?

As a landlord, there are always legalities and responsibilities to consider, and the past year has been no exception.

Why do more than a quarter of property sales fall through and what can agents do to stop it?

Buying and selling property in England and Wales is a complex process that most homebuyers actually know very little about.

Property Law Updates Estate Agents Need to Know

Every year that passes comes with new updates and amendments to property legislation and guidance.

Money-Saving Tips for New Property Investors

Getting into the property market as an investor is a challenging but incredibly lucrative endeavour, if you know how to make the right types of

How to Create a Low Maintenance Rental Property

For most landlords, the goal of a rental property is to make money. But maintaining a property can be expensive, especially when tenants are moving

How To Support Homebuyers During Lockdown 3.0

Following the government’s decision to enter into a third and hopefully final lockdown, house sales have, unfortunately, been hit hard yet again.

Meeting the Needs of the 2021 Renter

Letting services look very different to how they did a year ago. Although business continues

5 Productivity Tips for Landlords and Property Managers

Managing a property portfolio can be exhausting, especially if you run several different locations.

Strategies for lettings agents to overcome challenges in 2021

As a result of the global pandemic of 2020, 2021 is a year likely to have its fair share of challenges for many businesses across a host

How Pest Control Became a Hot Topic for Lettings Agents

COVID-19 has had an impact on everyone, including lettings agents and the property market as a whole.

Should you be worried about 'No DSS' lawsuits?

Finding a new home is a stressful task at the best of times, but for those receiving benefits, the process can be even more difficult.

How To Maintain Social Distancing At Your Lettings Agency

In light of the coronavirus pandemic, maintaining social distancing is now absolutely imperative – regardless of the industry you work in.

The landlord’s guide to living with lockdown

Everyone across the county is facing a completely changed economic landscape due to the Covid-19 outbreak and lockdown.

How to set up a smart home in rented accommodation

In today’s day and age of continual technological advances, the world is becoming more interconnected than ever before. Whether it be because of the

6 ways to stay in control of keys when working at distance

Most of us are in an extraordinary situation right now, as we try suppress the COVID-19 coronavirus. As we distance ourselves from others, we're all

My property software already does key management; Why would I need a dedicated system?

This is a really valid question that I hear a lot, so here's my comprehensive answer. If you're a letting agent, the existing software that manages

Are Letting Agents'​ Standards up to Scratch?

Nothing like a bit of controversy to brighten up your week is there? But in fact, I don’t think ‘standards’ is a topic discussed well enough within

Agent Rainmaker Live - No Ordinary Event

Like comparing chalk with cheese, I can promise you that Sally Lawson’s ‘Agent Rainmaker Live’ is an event like no other in the industry. It’s raw

HOST 2019 - Event Guide & Top Picks for new Short Stay conference

With the global vacation rental market projected to reach £167.9bn in 2019, this is a prime opportunity for growing your business, and increasing your

Agents: How to stop people forgetting to sign out keys

"I just can't get my staff to do things properly" has to be just about the biggest complaint I hear from estate agency owners and lettings managers as

Keyzapp Quick Facts: Beyond Barcodes

Barcodes were all the rage in the late ‘90s. Some enterprising agents and software makers began using barcodes to track keys and some of those systems

How to avoid losing keys in the busy period: A guide for short stay and holiday rental companies

It’s mid-July and that means the busy summer season is already underway for folks in the Northern Hemisphere. Keys will be going in and out of the

Public Sector Organizations: Keyzapp is now available on G Cloud

We're delighted to announce that Keyzapp has been approved for purchase by UK Public Sector organizations using the Government's Digital Marketplace

Bringing Smarter Key Management to Facilities

Keys. We still can’t live without them yet staying in control of them is time consuming and frustrating for facilities and building managers the world

Facilities Show 2019: What to look out for

With over 100 CPD Conference & Training sessions, a Workplace Wellbeing Show, a Smart Buildings Expo and many fun networking experiences for FMs

FUTURE: PropTech – 14th May 2019 - we're exhibiting!

What makes an Agent Rainmaker?

Over the past year, I’ve been lucky enough to spend time with an incredible bunch of inspiring people from all over the country who are proving how

Managing Keys: Is this your Worst Nightmare?

Imagine the scenario. Your client arrives to collect their keys. You go to the cabinet, and they aren’t there. Who has them? Where are they?

Letting Agents: Avoid this Big Mistake with your Keys!

Have you ever had that embarrassing situation when you can’t find a property key with a client standing right next to you? It usually isn’t your fault

We're proud to be partnering with the Guild of Professional Estate Agents

Combating the August Myth: It’s ANYTHING BUT a quiet month

August is a time for holiday and relaxing, right? Then why is it that everyone I speak to at the moment is stressed? There’s a “received wisdom” out

Free Tickets to ARLA Exhibition 2016 - Excel London

If you're looking improve an aspect of your lettings or property management business, the new-look ARLA Exhibition on 12th April in London's Excel

Resolutions 1 month in, don’t stop now!

Just like my colleague Tim many of us use the New Year as an opportunity to look back, take stock and make resolutions for change. Not many of our

Centralise Key Management

Whether you are already managing a large number of offices or beginning the process of expansion, Keyzapp can help remove a significant co-ordination

The easiest way to attach keys to key rings

Here's a life-saving (or at least nail-saving!) tip for anyone who has to regularly attach keys or key fobs to key rings.

Stay on top of the little things: My one & only New Year's resolution

Samuel Johnson wrote that "It is by studying little things that we attain the great art of having as little misery and as much happiness as possible"

2016 – Customer-led Lettings Success

A few weeks before Christmas, the Keyzapp team attended The Negotiator Conference in London, one of the largest annual forums for those working in the

7 great insights from Innocent Drinks CEO (with thoughts for the property industry)

Are we suggesting that our customers move 'Half a World Away' or is this just John Lewis?!

Deck your halls folks. The John Lewis Christmas TV ad is out! The soundtrack is beautiful. The art direction stunning. The message? Is it clear?

Minimising Risk and Maximising Potential – 5 highlights from the GLM conference 2015

The theme of this year's conference was Minimising Risk and Maximising Potential. As many would have expected, discussions homed in on the imminent

The tap and go revolution is beginning!

24% of UK households will be in the Private Rental Sector by 2020 - Vital information from - The Rent Check

Allsop and BDRC's The Rent Check report is essential reading for anyone wanting to get a handle on the current and future state of the Private Rented

Using Keyzapp to Centralise your Key Management

Whether you are already managing a large number of offices or beginning the process of expansion, Keyzapp can help remove a significant

"Find One Find All" Key tracker review

I have to admit, I lead a pretty chaotic personal life, and keeping track of my personal belongings has never been a strong point. When I spent a

Freeing up time with Keyzapp

When our team at Keyzapp visits lettings agents around the country, we frequently chat to staff, branch managers and even directors who are

Keyzapp is now a "Patent Pending" product. Here's a new video to celebrate!

We're pleased to announce that our patent application has been received and Keyzapp's innovative

Doing more with Keyzapp

As Keyzapp starts to gather more momentum in the marketplace, we thought we'd dig a little bit deeper into the ways you can make Keyzapp work hard in

Gain 20 minutes or more

A couple of weeks ago I talked about gaining 20 minutes a day and how this adds up to 2 weeks in a year.  How do we arrive at gaining 20 minutes

A big day - an easy system

In a small way yesterday was a big day. After several months of planning and preparation we shot the final parts of our new promotional video and made

Centralise key management with Keyzapp

As all growing businesses know, successful expansion brings with it its own set of challenges. In the lettings and property management industry

20 minutes a day productivity increase?

Not much, but this soon adds up to over 75 hours a year, that is 2 whole weeks over a year. I mention this because this week’s news has started with

London buses - they all come at once

A typical busy lettings office may give out on average 10 keys a day. That is an average of 20 transactions as each key has to be issued and returned.

ID cards identify trusted staff and contractors as well as making it fast to sign out keys

In a modern business environment, it’s not only important to have efficient, secure processes, but also to know you can trust the people you work with

Contactless Technology – possible fraud from your pocket?

Contactless payment has seen a massive rise to £2.3 billion in one year, an enormous change that demonstrates how many people are prepared to take on

Is the traditional metal key becoming obsolete?

This thought-provoking article from the BBC News Magazine has been published yesterday

The story of Keyzapp in a nutshell

When a friend in the property industry approached us and explained that he had problems with tracking keys, we were pretty certain we could help.

The IPhone 6, NFC and Keyzapp

We had 2 key aim when we built Keyzapp; we wanted it to be as quick and easy to use as possible whilst making sure it would work on a whole range

A new Key Management product. Who will use it?

For many people new means “good”, for others it means “be careful”. Do we know how a new product will be taken up?

5 Ws for cloud based key management

What, why, who, when, and where reasons for cloud based key management.

Your key management system will change soon

One thing we can be sure of is your business environment will change.  If I look back 15 years the business environment was very different from

Can you copy keys from a photograph?

If you could copy keys from a photograph what would it mean? How would security be compromised? Would this make people nervous?

Keyzapp is a natural evolution of key manangement

All organizations that manage keys have systems and procedures in place; after all, keys go back to the time of the Egyptians and Romans, however

Top Tips on How To Prevent Losing Keys

You’ve put your keys somewhere, but where? We’ve all done it. In fact, according to an article in the Daily Mail, misplaced items costs the