Property Management Trust Accounting

The chart of accounts your trust ledger deserves

A standardized, software-agnostic chart of accounts built specifically for property management trust accounting — with conversion guides for every major platform.

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NARPM Trust Chart of Accounts Standard
Operating Accounts
1000Trust Bank AccountAsset
1010Owner Reserve FundAsset
1020Security Deposit HoldingAsset
Liability Accounts
2000Owner Funds HeldLiability
2010Tenant Security DepositsLiability
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Conversion guides available for
What's included
The Standard Document
A complete, annotated chart of accounts for PM trust accounting.
Conversion Guides
Step-by-step mapping guides for AppFolio, Buildium, and more.
Why we built it
From the creators of the NARPM Accounting Standards

The NARPM Accounting Standards (NAS), released in 2018, brought clarity to PM corporate accounting. But trust accounting — the financial layer inside AppFolio, Buildium, RentVine, and similar systems — was left without a standard. Default charts of accounts are sparse. Most PMs fall back on IRS Schedule E, which helps with compliance but does little for operational insight. The NARPM Trust COA fixes that.

01
No default structure existed

Every PM system ships with a bare-bones COA, leaving firms to figure it out alone — with no industry guidance on what actually matters.

02
Compliance ≠ insight

Schedule E keeps you compliant, but it won't tell you where your operational bottlenecks are or how to drive performance across your portfolio.

03
A bridge to the NAS

The Trust COA connects seamlessly to the NARPM Accounting Standards, creating a coherent system from corporate accounting down to the property level.

Get the document
Download the NARPM Trust COA

Free to download. Fill out the form below and we'll send it straight to your inbox.

No spam. Just the document.

Who's using it
Property managers already on the standard

These firms have adopted the NARPM Trust COA across their portfolios.

Part of a bigger system
Connected to the NARPM Accounting Standards

The Trust COA was designed to work alongside the NAS — giving you a coherent, connected accounting system from the corporate level down to individual properties.

NARPM Accounting Standards (NAS)

The corporate-level accounting framework for PM companies — released in 2018, covering how to measure and understand your business performance.

NARPM Trust COA

The property-level accounting framework — a standard chart of accounts for trust accounting in your PM software, aligned to the NAS.

Unified reporting

With both in place, you can connect corporate performance metrics to property-level data for a complete picture of your business.

Built for what's next

The structure creates a foundation for benchmarking, AI-powered analysis, and portfolio-level insight as the industry evolves.

Common questions
FAQ
Is this free?
Yes. The NARPM Trust COA is free to download. Fill out the form above and it will be sent to your inbox immediately.
Which software does it work with?
The Trust COA is software-agnostic — it was designed to be implemented in any property management platform. We currently offer a conversion guide for RentVine, with AppFolio and Buildium coming soon.
Do I need the NARPM Accounting Standards first?
No. The Trust COA stands on its own and provides immediate value. That said, the two systems are designed to work together, and using both gives you the most complete picture of your business.
Will switching COAs disrupt our current data?
Migration requires careful planning, which is why we created both the conversion guides and the conversion service. The guides walk you through the process software by software, and our team can handle the migration for you if preferred.
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