Four phases. One record. Thirty-three key datapoints.
Every investment property moves through the same lifecycle: Acquisition, Fund, Hold, Exit. PaperWorking is built on that lifecycle, not adapted from generic project software. Here's what happens at each phase.
What a Project is
A Project is the home base for one investment. It holds the Deal (the property and its numbers), the phase it's in, the tasks and deadlines ahead, the documents, the budget, and the ledger of every dollar in and out. You work in the Project; PaperWorking calculates your metrics from it.
The work you already do becomes the numbers you need.
Phase 1 — Acquisition: decide if the deal works before you buy
Drop in an address and deal goals and the Deal Analyzer will make an automated valuation, then projects cap rate, IRR, and cash-on-cash before you've spent a dollar on diligence. Save the deals worth chasing to your pipeline; let the rest go with a record of why.
What you log here (purchase price, projected rents, rehab estimate) becomes the baseline your actuals are measured against later.
Raising money from partners? List the deal on the Deal Marketplace to track interest from other real estate investors in your network and pledges from investors in the PaperWorking community. Interest and pledges are tracked here; every closing happens between the parties, off-platform. No money moves through PaperWorking.
Phase 2 — Fund: get the money and paperwork lined up
Fund is the phase where PaperWorking helps you manage the transaction. Organizing every stakeholder in the process and contingency dates and earnest money, and alerts you before they expire. Contracts, title, and entity papers go into the document vault and once the transaction is complete the app moves to the next stage of the investments lifecycle.
Phase 3 — Hold: own it and improve it
Hold is where you prepare the property for the market. Are you selling, are you renting are you developing the land? This is where cost and profitability is lost and even serious REIs lie to themselves counting on the top line numbers. Hold links each milestone (inspection, rehab draw, staging, lease-up) to your line-item budget. Log expenses as they happen, or connect your accounts through Plaid to track rent payments and recurring costs automatically. The Holding Cost Clock shows what every extra day costs. Budget vs. actual stays visible, so a drifting rehab shows up in week three, not at closing.
The Vendor Marketplace earns its keep here: find the contractor, appraiser, or attorney when the project needs them.
Phase 4 — Exit: prove what it made
Sell it, or keep it as a rental. Either way, Exit is where the record pays off. PaperWorking generates performance reports from your actual project data: the documentation a buyer, lender, or appraiser expects. Walk into your refi with the files your lender wants, not a scattered folder you'll apologize for.
One deal, all the way through
Take one deal. You find a duplex and run the address through the Deal Analyzer; the projected cap rate and cash-on-cash clear your bar, so you save it to the pipeline. Those projections become your baseline.
You go under contract, and the Project moves to Fund. The inspection deadline, the appraisal contingency, and the earnest money date get tracked with alerts. Contracts and title work go into the vault.
At Hold, you build the rehab budget line by line and link each milestone to it. Every contractor draw and invoice gets logged against a line item. Rent comes in through your connected accounts. You never open a spreadsheet, but cost basis, holding costs, and cash-on-cash stay current, because the ledger is the work.
When you sell or refinance, the Exit report reads from that same ledger: actual NOI, DSCR, equity multiple. Your CPA gets the P&L export. The Project closes, the history stays, and your portfolio numbers update the day it happens.
Lead Investor and Team roles
An Investor account runs solo. An Investment Team account has a Lead Investor, the person running the team, who invites members, assigns tasks and phases, and controls what each can view or edit.
- Partners work the phases they're assigned.
- Your CPA reads the books without being able to touch them.
- Contractors and vendors see only the work they're assigned.
Two investors can also team up on a single Project without merging accounts.
Want to see it first? Walk through a live demo deal: pipeline, budgets, deadlines, and metrics included.