Every repair request triaged, dispatched and closed out with proof
A done-for-you tenant maintenance request automation is an AI agent that takes repair requests by portal, text, email and phone, asks the right follow-up questions, collects photos, sorts each job into emergency, urgent or routine and creates the work order in your property management system. It dispatches approved vendors, chases updates and confirms completion with the tenant. Your team approves spend above set limits. BufferSol builds and configures it, live in 3 to 6 weeks.
- Live in 3 to 6 weeks
- Works with AppFolio, Buildium and more
- People approve what matters
Is this you?
Property managers, landlords and housing providers running hundreds to thousands of doors whose repair requests arrive by calls, texts, emails and portal tickets and get lost between the tenant and the vendor.
- After-hours calls go to voicemail, and someone calls back in the morning to ask the same questions.
- Work orders say 'sink broken' with no photo, access details or urgency.
- Jobs sit in progress for weeks with no next step and no owner.
- Vendors mark jobs done and nobody checks with the tenant.
- Invoices arrive that do not match the original request.
Today vs done for you
The current way, and the new way
What your team does by hand today, and what the automation does instead, step by step.
How it works today
- A tenant calls, texts the manager or submits a portal request with a one-line description.
- A coordinator calls back to ask what is wrong, whether it is urgent and when someone can get in.
- They create the work order in AppFolio, Buildium, Yardi or Rent Manager and phone or text vendors until one accepts.
- Status updates depend on the vendor calling back, so the tenant calls again to ask what is happening.
- The vendor says it is done, the job is closed, and the invoice arrives later, sometimes for different work.
What it quietly costs you
- · Small problems become emergencies when they wait, and emergencies get handled at emergency rates.
- · Tenants who feel ignored complain, post reviews and do not renew.
- · Lapsed vendor insurance and unverified work create liability for owners.
How it works done for you
- The agent takes requests from the resident portal, text, email and the maintenance line, 24/7.
- It asks guided questions for each issue type, collects photos or video and confirms access and pet details.
- It applies your triage rules; true emergencies such as no heat, flooding or a gas smell trigger your emergency script and page the on-call person at once.
- It creates the work order in your property management system and offers the job to vendors in order of your approved list, checking that insurance certificates are current.
- Spend above the not-to-exceed limit you set goes to a manager or owner for approval before work starts.
- It chases vendors for updates, keeps the tenant informed and closes the job only with photo proof and tenant confirmation.
- Every message, decision, approval and invoice match is logged against the unit's history.
Your people
What changes for your team
| Role | Today | Done for you |
|---|---|---|
| Maintenance coordinator | Calling tenants back, phoning vendors and updating work orders by hand. | Handling the jobs the agent escalates, vendor relationships and units with repeat problems. |
| Property manager | Taking late-night calls and fielding complaints about slow repairs. | Approving spend over limits and reviewing open jobs by age and vendor. |
| On-call technician | Getting woken for issues that could wait until morning. | Getting paged only for real emergencies, with photos and details already collected. |
The numbers
What it's worth to you
Estimate the time and cost you get back with your own numbers. We baseline the real figures in week 1 and track these KPIs from day one.
Example inputs · change them to yours
The automated share covers intake, follow-up questions, work order creation, vendor dispatch and status updates; approvals and on-site work stay with people.
Staff time back
60 hours a month
About 0.4 full-time people freed for higher-value work
Capacity reclaimed a month
$1,800
A year
$21,600
An estimate from your inputs only. In week 1 we measure your real baseline, so results are tracked against your own numbers.
Time to first response
Minutes from request to first reply, by channel and time of day.
Time to completion
Days from request to confirmed completion, by priority tier.
Repeat visits
Work orders reopened or needing a second trip within 30 days.
Open jobs by age
Count of work orders open past your target time for each tier.
Resident satisfaction
A short survey sent on completion, tracked by property and vendor.
Works with the tools you already use
- AppFolio
- Buildium
- Yardi
- Rent Manager
- Entrata
- Property Meld
- Twilio
- Google Workspace
- Microsoft 365
- QuickBooks
Guardrails built in
- Not-to-exceed limits per job and per property; anything above them goes to a manager or owner for approval.
- Emergency scripts written and approved by you, with a person always paged for life-safety issues.
- Vendors dispatched only from your approved list, with current insurance certificates on file.
- Entry notice rules for each jurisdiction are built into scheduling.
- A full log of every request, decision, approval and message.
Why it hurts today
What teams say about this work
Common complaints from operators, reviewers and industry research.
Landlords with large single-family portfolios say that without a fixed intake and triage process, managers respond to whoever calls loudest and routine work drifts into emergency-rate work.
After-hours requests that go to voicemail force callbacks, repeated questions and manual sorting the next morning.
Owners describe repairs stalling between vendor assignment and confirmed completion, with nobody owning the next step, vendors slow to reply and invoices that do not match the request.
Work orders get marked done when a vendor says so, without confirming the repair or filing photos and invoices, which makes repeat problems hard to spot.
Owners of larger buildings describe middle-of-the-night no-heat calls during storms and the scramble to find a plumber who will come out.
Done for you
Live in 3 to 6 weeks
We do the build, the integrations and the rollout. Your team gives us access, reviews the pilot and approves go-live.
- 1
Week 1
Discovery and access
We map the workflow with your team, agree the outcomes and KPIs, measure today's baseline and get secure access to your tools.
- 2
Weeks 2–3
Build and connect
We build the agents and connect your systems, with your rules, approval steps, permissions and logging.
- 3
Weeks 3–5
Test and pilot
We test on your real history, then run a pilot on live work while your team reviews what the agent does.
- 4
Weeks 4–6
Go live and hand over
We roll out in stages, train your team, hand over dashboards and runbooks, and keep improving it with you.
Executive Ask: ask your business anything
One plain-English assistant connected to every system you run: CRM, helpdesk, ERP and accounting, HR, inbox and docs. Leaders get sourced answers in seconds and can trigger actions with approval. It respects everyone's existing permissions and logs every answer.
See Executive AskAsk it, for example
- Which work orders have been open longest, and who is holding them up?
- Which vendors were slowest to complete jobs this month?
- Which units have had the same problem reported more than twice this year?
How does it decide what counts as an emergency?
You decide, and the agent applies it. We write your triage rules with you: emergencies such as no heat in winter, active leaks, gas smells or no power; urgent items such as a broken fridge; and routine work. For anything life-safety, the agent gives your approved safety instructions and pages a person at once. Unclear cases are treated as urgent and escalated.
Will it approve spending or hire vendors on its own?
Only within limits you set. Each property or owner gets a not-to-exceed amount, and the agent dispatches from your approved vendor list. Anything over the limit, any vendor outside the list or any vendor without a current insurance certificate goes to a manager or owner for approval first. Every approval is recorded with who approved it and when.
Which property management systems does it work with?
We connect to AppFolio, Buildium, Yardi, Rent Manager, Entrata and Property Meld through their APIs or approved integration routes, so work orders, notes and photos live where your team already works. Where an API is limited, we agree a fallback during scoping, such as email-to-work-order. Tenants keep using the portal and phone number they already know.
How long until it is live?
It is live in 3 to 6 weeks. We start with your triage rules, vendor list, spending limits and emergency scripts, then connect your property management system, phone line and messaging. The agent runs on a few properties first, with coordinators reviewing every work order, and then rolls out across the portfolio once the team is confident.
What does it cost?
It depends on the number of doors, request volume, the channels you want covered and your software. We look at how maintenance works for you today on a short scoping call and then send a fixed written quote. There is no price on this page because every portfolio is different; the quote comes after that call.
Pairs well with
Operations & Supply Chain
Scheduling & Dispatch
Jobs, deliveries and dock slots scheduled and rebooked without phone tag
See the outcomeOperations & Supply Chain
Supplier & Vendor Follow-Up
Every open PO confirmed, chased and dated without inbox hunting
See the outcomeReal Estate & Property
Lease Administration & Renewals
Every lease date, notice and renewal tracked and acted on before it slips
See the outcomeSources
- How we triage maintenance requests across 236 doors, BiggerPockets Forums
- A Simple SOP for Managing Vendors and Following Up on Repairs, BiggerPockets Forums
- A Simple Maintenance SOP Every Rental Property Owner Should Have, BiggerPockets Forums
- Anyone around Bangor running bigger buildings?, BiggerPockets Forums
Get Tenant Maintenance Requests done for you
Tell us about your volumes and tools. A senior engineer replies within one business day with scope, timeline and cost.
Live in 3 to 6 weeks · Priced after a short call · Company emails only