How do I issue refunds to residents?

When a lease ends and you need to return a security deposit, or if a resident makes an overpayment and you want to refund the overage, you can use the refund feature on the resident's ledger.

Buildium's refund feature will record a check transaction to a resident, both on the resident ledger and in the bank account of your choosing.

NOTE: You cannot issue a refund electronically through Buildium, even if your bank account is set up for ePay.

Refunds in Buildium work a bit differently if you're refunding a liability account or an income account. In this article, you'll learn:

• How to refund liability and income to a resident
• NEW: How to add multiple payees to refund checks
• Ways to issue refund checks

How to refund liability and income to a resident

Refunding a liability to a resident

A common type of refund done in Buildium is a security deposit refund to a tenant who is moving out of a lease. Before you issue a refund, click here to learn about our suggested steps to take when ending a lease.

To refund a liability:

1. Type the tenant's name in the search bar, and click Lease ledger.
2. On the lease ledger, click Issue refund.
3. In the refund window, select which bank account to issue the refund from.
4. Enter the refund date, amount, and select a payee.
5. You can enter a check number, and select Queue check for printing if the bank account chosen has local check printing enabled.
6. When you enter a memo, we recommend including the total amount being refunded. When liability refunds appear on a tenant statement, the amount will show up as $0, as the liability refund does not affect the balances owed on their ledger.
7. In the Apply to balances section, you'll see the total liability amount that is available to refund in parentheses. If you're refunding all remaining liabilities, the numbers in the Amount column for the liability should match the amount in the Balance column.
8. When you've filled out the form, click Save.

When you've completed a liability refund to a tenant, you will not see the transaction appear on the lease ledger. As mentioned in step 6 above, liability refunds do not affect tenant balances, which is why you won't see the refund transaction on the ledger. To view the refund, click on the Deposits link on the ledger.

Refunding income to a resident

The process to refund income to a tenant is mostly the same as a liability refund, but refunding income affects tenant balances while refunding a liability does not. You may require an extra step or two after refunding income.

To refund income:

1. Type the tenant's name in the search bar, then click Lease ledger.
2. From the lease ledger, click Issue refund.
3. In the refund window, choose which bank account to issue the refund from.
4. Enter the refund date, amount, and payee.
5. You can enter a check number, and select Queue check for printing if the bank account chosen has local check printing enabled.
6. When you enter a memo, we recommend including the total amount being refunded.

There are two different scenarios you may run into when you reach the Apply to balances section of the form:

• If the resident you're issuing a refund for has a $0 balance at the time of the refund, the Apply to balances section will be blank, except for the amount. Select the account type you want to refund from the drop down menu, and the amount entered at the top of the window will apply to that balance. When the refund is saved, you will be left with an outstanding balance on the resident's lease ledger. Because the tenant had a $0 balance when the refund was issued, Buildium thinks the money that you refunded is still owed. To correct this, you can delete the charge that was entered for the payment you refunded, or you can issue a credit to waive the balance owed.
• If the resident had a credit balance on their ledger due to an overpayment of rent or another type of income, the Apply to balances section will show the overage amount in parentheses.  If you're refunding the entire amount of the overage, the numbers in the Amount column for the liability should match the amount in the Balance column. When the refund is saved you will be left with a $0 balance on the resident ledger.

How to add payees on refund checks 

You can now add more than one payee on resident refund checks. For rental properties, navigate to Rentals > Rent roll and select a Lease. On the individual Lease page, click into the Financials tab, then the overflow menu next to Enter charge, and Issue refund. 

For association properties, navigate to Associations > Ownership Accounts and select an Account. On the individual Account page, click into the Financials tab, then the overflow menu next to Enter charge, and Issue Refund.

On the Issue refund page, you can select the Unit Address, a specific Resident Address (of one of the available payees), or input a Custom Address when creating or editing a resident refund.

Ways to issue refund checks 

Buildium provides you with a couple of options for issuing resident refund checks. Once a check has been queued for printing, you can choose to print it locally or you can use Remote Check Printing and let Buildium print and mail the checks for you.

Learn how to set up check printing

Learn more about Remote Check Printing