EII - Cornell Startups

Joseph Edgar, MBA ’14, TenantCloud

Streamlining the rental process for tenants and landlords

May 12, 2015

Streamlining the rental process for tenants and landlords

by Joseph Edgar & Rhett Weiss

As a Johnson student (MBA ‘14) Joe Edgar was irritated by the lack of efficiency when it came to renting. Redundant paper applications, fees, mailing paper checks, no receipts and the pan on the floor collecting water from the leak in the ceiling due to the landlord not having enough time to come look at the problem.

It didn’t take Joe too long in business school to recognize the market had a problem, and he started thinking of a way to fix it. While finishing school, Joe connected with two friends in Chicago who had been working with property managers, and together the TenantCloud concept was formed. With most of the ideas sketched out and the business plan created, Joe graduated and set out to bring TenantCloud to fruition. Less than a year later TenantCloud has 13 employees spread from Chicago, Il to Austin, TX and is still hiring. As the CEO, Joe and his two partners have raised money from angel investors in Illinois and Texas and have seen the company grow from a few users to now being used in 25 countries.

Equipped with investors, a great team, and a fast growing company TenantCloud is a free service that helps renters and landlord better communicate. With top tier property management software renters get a reusable renter profile for storing recommendations and other information. It is marketed as, “the last rental application you ever need to fill out.” Landlords are given free access to one click marketing on multiple listing websites, automatic rent collection right to the landlord’s bank account, and easy to manage maintenance requests that allow the landlord to get bids from local service professionals.

TenantCloud’s revenue is generated by charging local service professionals a monthly fee for access to bid on jobs for landlords based on tenants’ maintenance requests. Now a student can communicate with their landlord in an efficient manner and landlords can get the needed help in fixing things like leaky roofs.

Joe has a vision of TenantCloud becoming a tool for any renter, landlord, or service provider to save time, money and grow their business. “My Johnson education was the best place for me to incubate the TenantCloud idea while learning the tools needed to make it happen,” says Joe.