I priced the popular landlord apps for a normal house. Five bedrooms, $850 a room, everyone paying by bank. The plan price ended up being the smallest part. Most “free” apps charge your tenants every time they pay. The per-unit ones charge you for every bedroom. All numbers are from each company’s own pricing page on October 8, 2026.
For a 5-bedroom house, Roomline is free and your tenants don’t pay any fees. A sixth room puts you on the $12 plan, or $96 a year.
A year in one five-bedroom house
Five rooms paying every month is 60 payments a year. For each app I picked the cheapest plan that works, then added the bank fee tenants pay each time.
Two come out at $0. Stessa’s free plan is the cheapest way to take rent online, and I’d tell a friend that. Roomline Free covers 1 house with up to 5 rooms, and it’s the only one here that knows the house has five bedrooms. Add a sixth room and Roomline is $96 a year. Cards change things fast. One tenant paying $850 by card every month adds about $356 a year in fees on Baselane or TurboTenant.
| App | Plan | You pay | Tenants pay | Year total |
|---|---|---|---|---|
 Roomline | Free | $0 | $0 | $0 |
 | Free | $0 | $0 (no-fee bank) | $0 |
 | Free | $0 | $120 ($2 each) | $120 |
 | Free | $0 | $150 ($2.50 each) | $150 |
 | Free | $0 | $120–$300 ($2–$5) | $120–$300 |
 | Yearly | $144 | $60 ($1 each) | $204 |
 | Cheapest | $180 | $90–$117 | $270–$297 |
 | Cheapest | $600 | Not listed | $600+ |
Per-unit pricing punishes rooms
Most landlord apps count units. So a 5-bedroom house is either one unit with five people crammed in, or five fake apartments you pay for one by one. On Avail Plus at $9 a unit, that’s $540 a year. Ten rooms is $1,080. On Roomline, ten rooms is still $12 a month, or $96 a year.
I built Roomline around the floor plan instead. Each bedroom has its own tenant, rent, lease and repairs. The kitchen, laundry and parking belong to the house.
- Every bedroom on one plan: who’s in it, what they pay, when their lease ends.
- One price, with no limit on rooms.
- A page for each tenant: what they owe, repairs with photos, their lease. Nothing to download.
Feature by feature
Every app does more than fits in a table. These are the things that matter most if you rent out rooms.
| Roomline | | | | | | | | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Floor plans, room by room | – | – | – | – | – | – | – | |
| State lease templates | – | – | – | |||||
| E-signing | Soon | – | paid | paid | paid | |||
| Tenant screening | paid | |||||||
| Online rent payments | Soon | |||||||
| Text messages to tenants | Soon | – | – | – | – | paid | ||
| Listings on Zillow and others | – | – | – | |||||
| Free plan | – | – | – | |||||
| Price a month | Free–$12 | Free–$20 | Free, from $12 | $15–$50 | Free, $9/unit | $12–$30 | Free–$28 | $50–$250 |
Where the others are ahead
Every other app here takes rent online right now. TurboTenant, TenantCloud and RentRoom can also text your tenants. Roomline can’t do either yet. I’m working on both. If you need Zillow listings or full tax bookkeeping, TurboTenant, Avail and Stessa are good at that, and they work fine alongside Roomline.
Common questions
Does Roomline charge my tenants anything?
No. Tenants pay you however they already do. Roomline records it and can match it to your bank on every plan. Paying by bank from the tenant page is in the works. Screening is separate. TransUnion charges the applicant for a SmartMove report unless you pay for it.
Can I text tenants from Roomline?
Right now the text button opens your phone with their number and a reminder already typed out. Texting back and forth inside Roomline is in the works.
Is there a free plan?
Yes. After the 45-day free trial you can stay on Free for 1 property and up to 5 rooms, for good. Need more? Everything is $12 a month, or $96 a year.