Buildium vs AppFolio
Vendor pages read live on 2026-09-04 · prices change without notice
These are property management platforms, not landlord tools, and the difference shows in how they are sold: one publishes a starting price, the other asks you to call.
- Best overall
- BuildiumA published entry price and per-screening costs you can budget before you speak to anyone.
- Best free
- NeitherBoth are paid platforms; a self-managed landlord under about twenty doors is better served elsewhere.
- Best for many units
- AppFolioBuilt for portfolios above its 50-unit minimum, with the pricing to match.
What each publishes
| Buildium | AppFolio | |
|---|---|---|
| Entry price | Essential starting at $62/month | Quote only |
| Minimum size | None published | 50-unit minimum plus a minimum spend |
| Tenant screening | $17 per screening; $35 applicant-paid; $20 enhanced on Growth and Premium | Not published |
| Payment fees | Incoming EFT $2.35 (Essential) / $1.35 (Growth); outgoing $0.99; cards 2.99% | Not published |
| Bank setup | $99 per business bank account | Not published |
Read live from buildium.com/pricing and appfolio.com/pricing on 2026-09-04. AppFolio's page states only that a minimum spend and a 50-unit minimum apply.
The threshold question
AppFolio's published 50-unit minimum answers the comparison for most readers of this site. Below that, it is not available to you, and Buildium's $62 a month entry tier is competing not with AppFolio but with a $12-a-month landlord platform.
The honest framing: property management software is bought when the work stops fitting in a spreadsheet and a phone — usually somewhere between fifteen and forty doors, and earlier if you have staff. Below that, the cost is real and the benefit is mostly reporting you do not yet need.
Choosing
Buying checklist
Count your doors against the minimum. Multiply every per-transaction fee by your monthly volume. Ask what the migration costs in hours, not dollars. Ask for the data export format before you sign. Keep your own rent ledger during the first quarter regardless — trusting a new system's numbers before you have reconciled them once is how a year of reporting goes wrong.