Do not cancel anything yet. The old account is the only complete copy of your records, and some vendors expect you to pull your data before the subscription ends, not after. Cancel last.
A switch has two halves. Getting data out is the half people rush, and it is where records go missing: the payment history nobody exported, the deposit amounts that lived in a note field, the vendor list that was never in the software at all. Getting data in is mostly mechanical once the export is clean.
Block out an afternoon for a small portfolio. Here is the order.
Export everything your old software will give you
Pull every export the tool offers, even the ones you think you will never need. Storage is cheap. A missing ledger two years from now is not.
What the common tools offer, from the pages cited below, checked in September 2026:
- TurboTenant. The rent roll exports as a CSV from the bottom of the Payments dashboard and carries tenants, lease terms, rent, deposits, and balances. The Charges and Deposits tabs under Payments each export their own CSV, and only the Deposits file includes payment notes.
- TenantCloud. Settings, then Security, then Export. You can take all data or pick properties, and the file covers transactions, leases, contacts, and maintenance. It only works on desktop, and large accounts get an email when the archive is ready.
- Buildium. TurboTenant’s help center describes Buildium’s export as Settings, then Export Data, one .xlsx file per data type. Buildium’s own onboarding templates run the other direction: you fill them in, and their team schedules the import.
- AppFolio. Reports can be exported, so plan on running each report you need (rent roll, tenant directory, ledgers, deposits held) and saving each file. Read your contract before you give notice: AppFolio’s Core terms say a customer who ends the subscription is expected to retrieve the data before it ends.
- DoorLoop. Any report exports to Excel or PDF. The export lives on the reports, so pull each one you need.
Screens change. If a menu path above no longer matches what you see, search the vendor’s help center for “export” and follow their current article.
Two things rarely come out in a clean file: uploaded documents and message history. Download signed leases, move-in reports, and any tenant letters one by one if you have to. Screenshot a thread if that is the only way to keep it.
Reconcile the export against your bank
An export is only as good as the books it came from. Before you move a single row, pick a cutover date (the last day of a month is easiest) and tie the numbers out.
For each tenant, write down three figures as of the cutover date: the balance owed or credited, the security deposit held, and the date of the last payment. Then check the deposit total against the bank account where the deposits sit. If the software says you hold $14,200 and the bank says $13,450, find the $750 now. It is much harder to find later, in a system that never saw the transaction.
LeaseRooster does not import payment history or transactions. Those opening balances are what you carry over by hand, so they need to be right.
Map your columns to the import templates
The old export will not match the new layout. Nobody’s does. Your job is to move each column into the right template, not to reformat the whole file.
LeaseRooster takes four files: properties, units, tenants, and leases. Download the blank template for each one from the import screen, then copy columns across. The rental property spreadsheet template and tenant information sheet template show the same columns with example rows, which helps when the export calls a field something odd.
A few mappings that trip people up:
- Unit labels must match exactly between the units file and the leases file. “Apt 2” and “#2” are different units to a computer.
- One tenant per row. If the old export put a couple on one line, split them.
- Delete any column holding a Social Security number, date of birth, or anything about race. The tenants import refuses those columns outright, and they do not belong in a bulk file.
- Dates in one format for the whole file.
There is no preset for any competitor’s export. You do the mapping yourself, once.
Preview the file and fix the rows that fail
Upload the properties file and click Preview import. The preview shows how many rows will come in and which rows have errors, with a reason for each. No records are created until you click Import.
Fix the failed rows in the spreadsheet, not in your head, and preview again. A clean preview is the goal before you commit anything.
Import in order, one file at a time
Properties first, then units, then tenants, then leases. Units find their property by name, and a lease row fails if its unit is not in yet.
Each import can be undone for 24 hours, but only use that on an import that added brand new records. If the file matched or updated anything already in your account, fix mistakes by hand instead. And if a first pass skipped some rows, upload only the rows you fixed.
Verify the counts after the import
Count three things in the old export and in the new account: properties, occupied units, and active leases. They should match exactly. Then open five tenants at random and compare rent, lease dates, and deposit against your Step 2 notes.
If a count is off by one, it is almost always a lease row that failed on a unit label. Check the error report before you go looking anywhere else.
Keep the old export on file
Save every file from Step 1 in one dated folder, somewhere you control, and do not delete it when the old account closes. Those files are now part of your tax and tenancy records, and the retention clock on them runs years. The guide on how long landlords should keep rental records covers the federal periods.
Tell your tenants where to pay now
Tenants do not care what software you use. They care where to pay and where to send a repair request. Send one short notice about ten days before the first rent due date under the new system: the new portal address, the date the old one stops working, and what happens to any autopay they set up. Autopay on the old platform will not follow them, so say so plainly.
Then, and only then, cancel the old account.
For the import screens themselves, see import and export in LeaseRooster or the help article on importing properties, units, tenants, and leases.
This is general information, not legal advice. Rules change and local ordinances vary. Confirm current requirements with your city, county, or an attorney before you act.