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🧾 RentBind · User Guide

Your rent, your proof — both sides covered.

RentBind is one shared record book for a small building: the landlord or manager keeps the rent, charges, and receipts in it, and each tenant can open their own unit in the same book and see exactly what they owe, what they have paid, and the receipt for every payment. Every entry is saved with a name and a date & time, so nobody has to take anybody's word for anything.

This guide has two halves. Part One is for the landlord or manager. Part Two is for tenants. Read the half that fits you — or read both, so you can see what the other side sees. It is the same book either way.

One thing to know before anything else: this book does not take payments. Rent money changes hands the way it always has — cash, a money order, a check, and so on. The book is where the payment gets written down and where the receipt lives, so the proof is safe.

About the pictures in this guide: the pictures below are screen pictures — drawings that match the real screens and their real words, made so this guide can be printed and shared safely. Every name, address, amount, and code in them is made up for the example. Your book will show your own building, your own units, and your own figures in the same places.

1. Opening the landlord side

The book opens on a first screen with two big choices — “I'm a Tenant” and “I'm a Landlord.”

1. Tap I'm a Landlord.
2. Type your name in the box labelled “Your name (shown on everything you do).” Use the name you want on your receipts and entries — it is printed as the name that recorded each thing.
3. Tap Open the landlord door →.

That is you in. At the top of your home screen you will see the red private-information reminder, then 🔔 Rent reminders — a friendly summary of who still owes and how much — and then the sections of your book as big buttons: 🏠 Units & rent, 🏢 Buildings & chat, 🧾 Property costs, 🔍 Property research, 🔧 Maintenance, ⚠️ Tenant issues, 📖 Record book, 🧾 Receipt wallet, and ⚙️ Settings. Most days, Units & rent is the only one you need. To leave, tap Switch door at the top.

🧾 RentBindFirst screen

Your rent, your proof —
both sides covered.

One shared record book for tenants and landlords: rent, receipts, contracts, and messages — every one saved with a name and a date & time.

🔑 I'm a Tenant 🏠 I'm a Landlord

2. Buildings and units

A building is a property — a house or a building at one address. A unit is one rentable home inside it, like Unit A or Unit B. Tenants in the same building share that building's chat room; a unit with no building is treated as its own single-unit building, so its tenants are never placed in a room with strangers.

To add a building:

1. Tap 🏢 Buildings & chat.
2. Fill in the new-building form: the building's name and address, and — only if they fit your building — its type, the property manager's name, the owner's name, the whole-building rent total, and its own late fee and grace days. Leave the late fee and grace days blank to use the book-wide settings (see Settings).
3. Choose how this building's contracts are signed: Paper, or E-sign using the book's own built-in signing (a typed name with the date & time — it is not a certified outside signing service).
4. Save. The building now appears in the building picker when you add units.

To add a unit:

1. Tap 🏠 Units & rent. The add-a-unit form is at the bottom of that section, under the heading “＋ Add a new unit.”
2. Unit name * — for example, “Maple Court — Unit B.”
3. Address — the unit's street address.
4. Rent amount ($) * — the rent for one period, for example 600.
5. How often is rent due? — Weekly, Every 2 weeks, Monthly, or Quarterly.
6. The due day * — the day the rent falls due in each period (for monthly rent, a day from 1 to 28).
7. Building (for the building chat room) — pick the building this unit belongs to, or leave it as “No building — its own single-unit building.”
8. Unit type and Is anyone living here? (Occupied or Vacant) — pick what fits.
9. Tap Add unit.

Fields marked * must be filled in — the form will not save without them. You can change a unit's name, address, rent, due day, building, type, or its own late fee and grace days later from that unit's file, with the edit form on its card. A unit that has receipts can never be deleted — see the receipt rules.

3. Adding a tenant and their contract code

Tenants do not sign themselves up, and there is no public sign-up page. You add each tenant, and the book makes that tenant a contract code — a short code of letters and numbers in three groups, like the made-up example P8KD-3MQT-7ZRA. That code is the tenant's key: typed on the tenant door, it opens exactly that tenant's unit — nobody else's. One code belongs to one contract, one tenant, and one unit, and more than one tenant can live on the same unit, each with their own code and their own name on everything they do.

1. In 🏠 Units & rent, find the unit in 📁 Tenant files and tap 📁 Open file. An open file shows only that tenant's unit — to look at another tenant at the same time, open their file in a new tab or window.
2. On the unit's card, tap 👥 People & contracts.
3. In the “Add another tenant to this unit” form, type the tenant's full name *.
4. Type their email, if you know it — it is helpful, not required.
5. Tap Add tenant & make their contract code.
6. The new code appears right there, with the words “give this code to the tenant so they can open their door.” Give the code to that tenant — in person or by a message you trust — and keep it off anything public.

From then on, that tenant's name, code, and contract status (Active or Ended) are shown in People & contracts. A few more things live on that same part of the card:

• Lease dates and the security deposit record — start and end dates, and the deposit amount with the dates it was received and returned and any deductions, in plain words with the reason. This is a record only; no deposit money moves through the book.
• 🔑 Reset password — if a password reset is needed, this button sends the tenant a reset link. The tenant types their own new password through that link. You never see it and never type it for them, and every reset is written in the record book.
• End lease — ends that contract. From that moment its code no longer opens the tenant door. The contract and its whole history stay in the record.
• You cannot edit a tenant's own information from your side — their profile is theirs. Your management work (units, charges, payments, files, replies, waivers) is separate, and all of it is logged.

4. Adding charges — rent, late fees, and other charges

A charge is an amount a unit owes. Charges are one half of every balance; payments are the other half. There are three easy ways to add one, all on the unit's card:

The regular rent charge — tap the rent button on the card (its label follows the unit's rent schedule, for example “Add monthly rent charge”). It fills in the unit's rent amount and its next due date for you. Tap it once for each period's rent you want on the books.

A late fee — when part of a unit's balance is past its grace period, tap Add late fee. It adds the late fee that applies to that unit (its own setting first, then its building's, then the book-wide setting) with today's date. The button is greyed out when nothing is overdue.

Any other charge — use the small form under “What's owed” on the card:

1. Type what the charge is for * — for example, “Key replacement.”
2. Type the amount ($) *.
3. Pick the due date.
4. Choose One-time charge or Recurring charge.
5. Tap Add a different charge.

Every charge shows in the unit's “What's owed” list with its label, whether it is one-time or recurring, its due date, and its amount.

5. How a balance is figured

There is no balance typed in anywhere, and nobody edits one by hand. The book works it out fresh from the rows, every time, the same way for you and for the tenant:

You read the balance at the top right of the unit's card, under OWED NOW. If part of it is past the due date plus the grace days, the card also says how much is past the grace period and how late it is. The tenant sees the very same figure on their side, under YOU OWE — there is one number, worked out one way, for both of you.

A worked example, with made-up numbers. Maple Court — Unit B, tenant Sam Rivera, rent $600 a month:

What's owed	Amount
November rent — due Nov 1	$600.00
Late fee — November	$25.00
Open charges, added up	$625.00
Payments received (not voided)	Amount
Nov 3 — Cash	$400.00
Nov 10 — Money order	$100.00
Payments, added up	$500.00
Balance owed ($625.00 − $500.00)	$125.00

So Unit B's card reads “OWED NOW $125.00,” and Sam's side reads “YOU OWE $125.00.” Same book, same maths, same number.

Maple Court — Unit BLandlord view

Rent $600.00 · Monthly · due on day 1 · Late fee here: $25.00 after 5 grace days

OWED NOW

$125.00

💵 Record payment Add late fee ($25.00) ✉️ Messages 👥 People & contracts

6. Recording a payment and sending the sealed receipt

When a tenant pays you — however the money actually changes hands — you write it down here. Recording the payment and sending its receipt are one and the same step: the moment you save, the receipt is sent and sealed (see the next section for what “sealed” means).

1. Open the unit's file and tap 💵 Record payment on its card.
2. Amount paid ($) * — exactly what they paid, for example 400.00. A part payment is fine — record what was actually paid, and the balance will show the rest.
3. Date paid * — the day the money changed hands.
4. Paid by (tenant) — pick the tenant's name from the list, so the receipt is issued to the right person.
5. How they paid — pick from the real choices on the form: Cash, Money order, Check, Bank transfer, Card, or Other.
6. Logo for this receipt only (optional) — leave it blank and the receipt uses your book's logo from Settings. A logo picked here appears on this one receipt only.
7. Tap Save payment & send sealed receipt.
8. Check the green confirmation that appears. It names the receipt's full receipt number/code — for example, in made-up form, RCPT-ABCD-EFGH-JKMN-PSTU-VWXY-ZABC-0007. That same full number is on the receipt copy and in the message the book posts about the payment. A sent receipt without its receipt number is not complete — if the confirmation ever says the number did not come back, check the receipt in the list before relying on that send.

The payment now appears in the unit's Payments received list, the balance drops by that amount, and a message about the receipt is posted in the unit's official messages, where the tenant can see it. Nice and simple — you did the kind thing and the book keeps the proof of it.

💵 Record paymentMaple Court — Unit B

Amount paid ($) *400.00

Date paid *Nov 3

Paid by (tenant)Sam Rivera

How they paidCash

Save payment & send sealed receipt

7. The receipt rules

Every payment you record is a receipt, and receipts follow plain rules that protect the tenant and you equally:

8. Fixing a mistake — void, never erase

Typed $40 instead of $400? Wrong date? It happens, and the book has an honest way to fix it that never looks like tampering. The original receipt stays in the record exactly as it was sent. What changes is its standing: it gets marked VOID, and — when the payment itself was real — a corrected receipt takes its place.

To void a receipt and issue a corrected one (the usual fix):

1. Find the receipt in the unit's Payments received list.
2. Tap Void & issue corrected receipt under it.
3. Correct amount paid ($) * — the amount as it should have been.
4. Correct date paid * — the right date.
5. How they paid — the right method, if that was wrong too.
6. Why is this being corrected? * — a short, honest reason, for example “amount typed as $40 instead of $400.” The reason is saved with both receipts, so it must be at least a few words.
7. Tap Void & send corrected receipt.

To void a receipt with no replacement — for example, a payment recorded twice: tap Void [that receipt] under it instead, type why it is being voided * (for example, “recorded twice by mistake”), and tap Yes — void (original stays in the record).

Here is what the book does, either way:

• The original receipt is marked VOID, with who voided it, when, and the reason — all kept on the record. It stops counting toward the amount paid.
• A corrected receipt (when you issue one) is a new, separate receipt, sealed just like the first. It keeps the identical full code as the original — not a new code, and not the next number in the sequence — with only its revision number added in brackets: the first correction adds (1), a correction of that one adds (2), and so on. It keeps the same recipient branding and names the receipt it corrects.
• A message about the void — and about the corrected receipt, with its full number including the (1) — is posted in the unit's official messages, and every step is written in the record book.
• The original, the void, and each corrected receipt all stay in the record as separate entries. Anyone reading the file later can follow the whole story. That is the point: a correction you can show is worth far more than a tidy-looking edit.

A small worked example, with made-up numbers. Unit A, tenant Alex Morgan, has one charge — rent of $400. A payment is recorded as $40 by mistake, so the balance wrongly shows $360 owed. The landlord voids that receipt and issues a corrected one for $400, with the reason “amount typed as $40 instead of $400.” The $40 receipt stays in the list, marked VOID, and no longer counts. The corrected $400 receipt counts instead, and the balance becomes $400 − $400 = $0 — Paid up ✓. Both receipts carry the same code; the corrected one ends in (1).

9. Forgiving a charge (waiving a fee)

Sometimes the kind and fair thing is to let a charge go — a late fee for a tenant who told you ahead of time, for instance. The book calls that waiving, and it is done in the open:

1. Find the charge in the unit's What's owed list.
2. Type the reason in the box beside it — a reason is required; the waive button stays greyed out until you have written one.
3. Tap Waive this fee (or Waive this charge).

The charge stays in the list, shown struck through, with “Waived by [your name] on [date & time]. Reason: [your reason]” under it — and it no longer counts in the balance. Nothing disappears; the forgiveness itself becomes part of the record, which protects you if anyone ever asks why that fee was never collected.

10. Messages, files, and the record book

• ✉️ Messages (the official portal). Each unit has an official message thread between you and that unit's tenants. Tap ✉️ Messages on the unit's card, type, and send. Every message is saved with the sender's name and the date & time, and nothing is ever deleted — this thread is the proof for both sides, so use it for anything that matters: notices, agreements, and replies about rent. Receipts and voids also post their notices here automatically.
• Building chat. Separately from the official thread, each building has a chat room shared by that building's tenants, and you as manager may join the main room to talk with them there. One-to-one matters still belong in the official portal, where they are recorded. A unit with no building has its own room, with only its own tenants in it.
• 📁 Files. On the unit's card, 📁 Files holds that unit's folders — Contracts, Receipts, and Other files. Tap “＋ Add a contract,” “＋ Add a receipt,” or “＋ Add a file” to file a document (up to 15 MB), and Open beside any file to view it. When a contract is signed with the book's built-in signing, the signed contract record is added to that tenant's contract folder on its own — no re-uploading needed.
• 🔧 Maintenance. Tenants can report a repair from their side; you can also record one on a unit's file. Each request is tracked from reported, to in progress, to completed, with names and times.
• ⚠️ Tenant issues. A serious problem — an eviction, a unit left damaged — can be recorded with evidence files attached. It stays clearly marked PENDING / UNVERIFIED until a second manager has checked the evidence and signed it. Nothing counts as confirmed before that second check, and the tenant can see that same “pending” wording on their side.
• 📖 Record book. This is the book's diary: payments, receipts sent, voided, and corrected, waived fees, contract codes created, password resets, messages, issues — everything, written as it happens, with the name and the date & time. Nothing in it is deleted. You can read the whole book, or open one unit's file to read just that file's record.
• 🔔 Rent reminders. Your home screen keeps the friendly summary up top: how much is still owed across the building, who owes it, what is late, and when the last reminder for each unit was sent and by what method. A tenant can choose how they would like to be reminded — text, a phone call, email, and other choices — from their own side, and their choice shows on their file.

11. Settings

Tap ⚙️ Settings for the book-wide choices:

• Late fee ($) and Grace period (days) — the book starts with plain defaults of a $25 late fee after a 5-day grace period. They were not picked from your leases, so change them to match your own agreements. A building or a single unit can carry its own late fee and grace days, which then apply there instead.
• Manager / landlord name shown — the name printed as the issuer on receipts.
• Receipt brand color — the color band across the top of every new receipt. Leave it blank for the book's default color.
• 🖼️ Receipt logo — upload a logo image (PNG, JPEG, WebP, or GIF, up to 2 MB) and every new receipt is printed with it in its header, shown whole and never stretched. With no logo, receipts show the color band with a monogram of your initials instead. Receipts already sent always keep the branding they were sent with.

Tap Save settings when you are done. You will see “Saved ✓.”

1. Opening your unit

You do not sign up on your own, and there is no public sign-up page to find. Your landlord adds you to the book and gives you a contract code — a short code of letters and numbers in three groups, printed on your contract, like the made-up example P8KD-3MQT-7ZRA. Keep it private, the way you would a key: it opens your unit, and only your unit.

1. On the first screen, tap 🔑 I'm a Tenant.
2. Type your contract code in the box labelled “Type the contract code from your contract.” Capital letters are fine — the book tidies them up for you.
3. Tap Open my unit →.

You can also tap your name in the list under “or tap your name” if your landlord's book shows it there. Either way, you land on your own unit — your rent, your charges, your receipts. You will never see another tenant's unit, amounts, or messages, and they will never see yours.

Two things worth knowing about your code: if a code is typed wrong, the book simply says it does not match any contract — check the letters and numbers and try again. And when a contract ends, its code stops opening the unit, so a code from an old home will not work on a new one; a new contract always gets a new code. If you lose your code, ask your landlord — it is shown on your file on their side. To leave, tap Switch door at the top.

At the top of your screen sits the same red reminder your landlord sees: please do not send Social Security numbers, bank account or card numbers, passwords, or other private personal information in messages, chat, or uploads here. If something like that is ever needed, share it in person or by phone instead.

2. Seeing what you owe

Near the top of your screen, under YOU OWE, is your balance in big, clear numbers. If you are all caught up, it says “Nothing — paid up ✓.” Under it you can see your rent amount, how often it falls due, the day it is due, and the next due date, plus the late fee and how many grace days come before it applies.

Under What's owed is the full list behind that number — every charge on your unit, with what it is for, its due date, and its amount. Your balance is worked out from that list and your payments, the same way for you and for your landlord:

An example, with made-up numbers. Sam, in Unit B, has November rent of $600 and a $25 late fee — $625 of charges. Sam paid $400 in cash on Nov 3 and $100 by money order on Nov 10 — $500 of payments. $625 − $500 = $125 still owed, and that is exactly what Sam's screen shows. When the last $125 is paid and recorded, the screen will say “Nothing — paid up ✓.”

Maple Court — Unit BTenant view

YOU OWE

$125.00

Rent is $600.00 · Monthly · due on day 1 · Late fee is $25.00 after 5 grace days.

Your payment receipts

$400.00 · Nov 3 · Cash — Receipt …-0001

$100.00 · Nov 10 · Money order — Receipt …-0002

👁 View receipt copy🔒 Check against sealed master

3. Seeing what you have paid

Beside “What's owed” is Your payment receipts — every payment your landlord has recorded for your unit, newest in the same list as the rest, each with its amount, the date paid, and how you paid (cash, money order, check, bank transfer, card, or other). Under each one, the book says it plainly: “This receipt is your proof of payment.”

A few honest things to know:

• You do not pay through this book. You pay your landlord the way you always have, and your landlord records it here. If you have paid and do not see it, ask your landlord to record it — and keep your own note of the date and amount until it appears.
• A part payment counts. If you paid part of the rent, that part appears as its own receipt, and your balance drops by exactly that much.
• A receipt marked VOID no longer counts. It stays in your list, struck through and marked VOID, with the reason and a pointer to its corrected receipt if one replaced it — see section 6.
• Your landlord sees this same list for your unit, with the same amounts. There are not two versions.

4. Your receipts — view a copy, check the seal

Each receipt in your list has your name and unit printed on it as its recipient branding, your landlord's name as the issuer, and its own full receipt code. The code starts with “RCPT” and has eight sections joined by dashes: the first seven sections are the same on every receipt in the book, and the eighth is a simple sequence — 0001, 0002, 0003 — so each new receipt takes the next number. A made-up example of a full code looks like RCPT-ABCD-EFGH-JKMN-PSTU-VWXY-ZABC-0007.

To view your copy of a receipt:

1. Find the payment under Your payment receipts.
2. Tap 👁 View receipt copy.
3. Your copy opens: the full receipt code, the amount, the date paid, how you paid, your unit and its address, who issued it and when it was recorded, and — for a corrected receipt — which receipt it corrects. Tap Close copy when you are done.

You can open that copy at any time, whenever you are signed in with your contract code. Your landlord can view a copy of the same receipt through their door. Nobody else can: the book checks that the person asking is a party to that receipt, and refuses anyone who is not.

To check a receipt is genuine:

1. Under the same receipt, tap 🔒 Check against sealed master.
2. The book compares the receipt on file with its sealed master copy and answers in plain words — for a good receipt: “✓ … receipt [its full code] matches its sealed master copy exactly,” along with the master's fingerprint.

The check never opens the master copy — it compares fingerprints, a kind of check code, so the master stays sealed away from everyone while still proving your copy is the real thing. (A very old receipt recorded before sealing began will say honestly that no sealed master exists for it. It still cannot be edited or deleted.)

Receipt — issued toYour copy

Sam Rivera · Maple Court — Unit B · 12 Maple Street

RCPT-ABCD-EFGH-JKMN-PSTU-VWXY-ZABC-0001

$400.00 · paid Nov 3 · Cash
Issued by Pat Miller · 🔒 Sent & sealed — this receipt cannot be edited, and no one can delete it.

5. Why a receipt can be checked — and can never be deleted

This is the heart of the book, and it is there to protect you:

• The moment a payment is recorded, its receipt is sent & sealed. At that same moment, the system keeps an encrypted master copy of it, out of reach of both you and your landlord. The copies you both view come from that sealed record.
• Because the master is sealed, the check works. If anyone ever tried to change a receipt — a different amount, a different date — it would no longer match its master, and the check in the last section would say so, in plain words. A receipt that matches its master is a receipt you can rely on.
• No one can delete a receipt — not your landlord, not you, not anyone. There is no delete button for one, and even deleting a whole unit is refused while it has receipts. Your proof of payment cannot quietly go missing.
• No one can edit one, either. Not the amount, not the date, not how you paid. The only honest fix for a mistake is the void-and-correct path in the next section, and it leaves the original sitting right there in the record for anyone to see.
• Everything is written down as it happens. Payments, receipts, voids, corrections, waived fees, and messages are all entered in the record book with a name and a date & time, and your side includes a 📖 Your record book section where you can read your own unit's entries. Nothing in it is deleted.

Put together, that means your rent history is not a matter of memory or trust. It is a record both sides can check, and neither side can rewrite. That is good for you, and — fairly — it is good for your landlord too.

6. If a receipt looks wrong

Mistakes happen — an amount typed wrong, a date off by a day. Here is what to expect, and what to do:

1. Tell your landlord, in the official messages on your screen (see the next section), so your message is saved in writing with your name and the date & time. Say what is wrong: “The Nov 3 receipt says $40; I paid $400 in cash.”
2. Your landlord voids the wrong receipt and issues a corrected one. They cannot simply edit it — nobody can — and they cannot delete it.
3. In your list, the old receipt stays visible, marked VOID, with who voided it, when, and the reason, and a note naming the receipt that replaced it. The voided amount stops counting toward what you have paid.
4. The corrected receipt appears as its own receipt, sealed like any other, with the corrected amount and date. It keeps the identical full code as the original, with only its revision number added in brackets — (1) for the first correction, (2) for a second. That little (1) is part of its number, not a footnote: it is how anyone can tell the correction apart from the original while seeing they belong together.
5. A message about the void and the corrected receipt, carrying its full number including the (1), is posted in your unit's official messages, so you have the news in writing without having to ask.
6. Check your balance: it now counts the corrected receipt instead of the voided one. And you can run 🔒 Check against sealed master on the corrected receipt, just like any other.

If a receipt is marked VOID with no corrected receipt — for example, a payment that was recorded twice — the record will say that too, with the reason. Either way, nothing vanishes, and the reason is always on show. If a charge (rather than a receipt) looks wrong, the same advice holds: message your landlord in writing. Charges that are forgiven stay visible, struck through and marked waived with the reason, so you can see exactly what was let go.

7. Messages, your contract, and asking for a repair

• ✉️ Message your landlord. This is the official place for anything that matters. Type your message and send — every message is saved with your name and the date & time, and nothing is ever deleted. That is your cover, and your landlord's too. Receipts, voids, and corrections also post their notices into this thread automatically, so your proof and your messages live together.
• Building chat. Your building also has a chat room, shared only with tenants in your own building; your property manager may join that main room. It is the friendly, everyday space. Anything one-to-one or important still belongs in the official messages above, where it is recorded. If your unit has no building, your chat room is just your own unit.
• ✍️ Your contract. This section shows your lease dates and your security deposit record — the amount, when it was received, when it was returned, and any deductions with their reasons. It is your contract only; nobody else's contract or amounts are ever shown to you. If your building uses the book's built-in signing, you sign here by typing your name — the book records your name with the date & time. That built-in signing is the book's own simple capture, not a certified outside signing service. When signing is complete, a signed-contract record is added to your contract folder on its own.
• 📁 Your files. Your contract folder and your receipts folder hold the files for your unit. You can open any of them, and you can add a file of your own to either folder — a photo of a paper receipt, for instance.
• 🔧 Maintenance requests. Something broken? Report it here. Your request is saved with your name and the date & time, and you can watch it move from reported, to in progress, to completed.
• 🔔 How you get rent reminders. You can pick the way that works for you — a text, a phone call, email, Messenger, WhatsApp, Snapchat, X, the book's portal only, a paper letter, or something else you describe — plus a backup way and a note about what you need (for example, “text only” or “call only — no smartphone”). Only what you type is saved, and it shows only on your own file.
• Notes and reasons. There is a place on your screen for notes — if rent will be late, or life has happened, you can write it down there, dated and in your own words, where your landlord will see it as part of the record.
• Records about this unit. If a serious record exists about your unit — damage noted at move-out, for example — it appears on your screen too. If it says PENDING — NOT VERIFIED, it is one person's note only: it is not confirmed until a second manager has checked the evidence and signed it, and it should not be treated as settled before then.
• Password resets. If your landlord sends you a password reset, a notice appears at the top of your screen. Follow it and set your new password yourself — nobody else ever sees it, not even your landlord — then tap I set my new password ✓ so the record book shows it was finished.