Rent and lease reminders
When to use it
Section titled “When to use it”- You keep a tenant list in Google Sheets or Excel with each tenant's rent due date and whether it is paid.
- Rent is paid monthly, quarterly or once a year, and you chase it by hand today.
- You want to talk to tenants about renewing well before the lease ends.
Where the data comes from
Section titled “Where the data comes from”| How | What |
|---|---|
| A Google Sheet or Excel file, synced | Your tenant sheet, synced every hour as People: phone, email, unit, rent due date, rent status (paid or due) and lease end date. |
| A CSV upload | Or a one-off CSV of the same columns to start with. |
What it sets up
Section titled “What it sets up”| Kind | Name | What it does | Lands |
|---|---|---|---|
| Team | Property managers | Calls tenants with late rent and talks about lease renewals. | Empty |
| Segment | Rent due soon | Rent due within the reminder window and not paid. | Ready |
| Segment | Rent due today | Rent due today (the date started in the last day) and not paid. | Ready |
| Segment | Rent overdue | Past the due date by a day or more, within the chasing window, and not paid. | Ready |
| Segment | Lease ending soon | Lease ending within the notice period. | Ready |
| Template | Rent due soon (SMS) | SMS before the rent is due. | Ready |
| Template | Rent due today (SMS) | SMS on the due day. | Ready |
| Template | Rent overdue (SMS) | SMS once rent is late. Factual, with an offer to talk. | Ready |
| Template | Rent due soon (WhatsApp) | WhatsApp reminder before the rent is due (needs Meta approval). | Ready |
| Template | Rent due today (WhatsApp) | WhatsApp reminder on the due day (needs Meta approval). | Ready |
| Template | Rent overdue (WhatsApp) | WhatsApp message once rent is late (needs Meta approval). | Ready |
| Template | Lease ending soon (email) | Email when the lease is coming to an end. | Ready |
| Follow-up | Rent reminder 1: due soon | Daily run over "rent due soon": one reminder per period. | Off |
| Follow-up | Rent reminder 2: due today | Daily run over "rent due today": one reminder. | Off |
| Follow-up | Rent reminder 3: overdue | Daily run over "rent overdue": a message, then a call task for the manager if still unpaid. | Off |
| Follow-up | Lease ending: renewal talk | Daily run over "lease ending soon": an email to the tenant and a renewal task for the manager. | Off |
The questions it asks
Section titled “The questions it asks”| # | Question | Default | Fills in |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | What should messages call you? (your company or the building) | none, must answer | org_name |
| 2 | How do tenants pay? (a few words, without account numbers) Say it the way you would say it out loud. The message never carries bank details. | none, must answer | pay_info |
| 3 | Which team calls tenants whose rent is late and talks about renewals? (one person is fine) | Property managers | manager_team |
| 4 | Which number should tenants call with questions? | ‹workspace phone› | manager_phone |
| 5 | Should the rent reminders go by WhatsApp instead of SMS? Needs a connected WhatsApp Business number and Meta-approved templates. | No | use_whatsapp |
Other settings
Section titled “Other settings”These have defaults. Change any that don’t fit.
| Setting | Default | Key |
|---|---|---|
| Trait with the rent due date | rent_due_date | rent_due_trait |
| Trait that says if the current rent is paid (paid or due) | rent_status | rent_status_trait |
| Trait with the lease end date | lease_end_date | lease_end_trait |
| First rent reminder before the due date | 14d | remind_before |
| How long after the due date to keep chasing | 30d | overdue_window |
| How long before the lease ends to start the renewal talk | 60d | lease_notice |
| Daily send time | 09:00 | send_time |
| Time zone for the daily run | ‹workspace timezone› | timezone |
| Sender address | ‹workspace default_sender› | email_from |
| Greeting when a first name is missing | there | greeting_fallback |
Timings
Section titled “Timings”- Runs every day at 09:00 in ‹workspace timezone›.
- A reminder when rent is due within 14d, another on the due day, and an SMS (or WhatsApp) plus a call task for Property managers once it is late, for up to 30d. The call task is created two days after the message if rent is still unpaid.
- The lease-end email and renewal task start when the lease ends within 60d. Each tenant gets it once per lease (a 90-day cooldown).
Channels
Section titled “Channels”| Channel | Needed for | Before it can send |
|---|---|---|
| sms | The rent reminders (or WhatsApp, if you switch it on) | An SMS provider, or Origamy managed SMS after business verification (KYC). |
| The rent reminders, if you answer yes to WhatsApp | A connected WhatsApp Business number, and each of the three templates approved by Meta. | |
| The lease-end reminder | A verified sending domain for ‹workspace default_sender›. |
What you need to do
Section titled “What you need to do”- Keep these columns in your tenant sheet: phone, email, unit, rent_due_date (a date like 2026-12-01), rent_status (exactly paid or due, never blank) and lease_end_date. Set the status to paid when rent is received and back to due when the next period starts, so nobody who has paid is reminded.
- Add your property managers to the Property managers team. If you manage everything yourself, put yourself in it. A task assigned to an empty team reaches nobody.
- If you chose WhatsApp: connect your WhatsApp Business number and submit the three rent templates (rent_due_soon_reminder, rent_due_today_reminder and rent_overdue_reminder) for Meta approval before switching the follow-ups on.
- Verify the sending domain for the lease email. For SMS, connect a provider or finish business verification.
- Check the segment sizes against your sheet, then switch the follow-ups on and test with your own phone and a fake tenant.
- Keep reminders factual and polite. Messages never carry amounts, bank details or threats, and the tone should follow your local tenancy rules.
- Rent is often paid a year in advance in Lagos and monthly in London, so the wording only says “your rent is due” and never “this month’s rent”. If you collect yearly, set the reminder window to 30 or 45 days. If you collect monthly, keep the default 14 days or shorten it to 7.
- Keep the status column honest. The reminders only skip tenants whose status says paid, and a blank cell means that tenant gets nothing at all. A quick end-of-week check of the Rent overdue segment against your bank statements avoids messaging someone who paid yesterday.
- Tell tenants in the tenancy agreement or at move-in that you will send reminders by SMS or WhatsApp and email, and which number the messages come from. Keep the tone factual, never mention an amount or a consequence in a message, and follow your local tenancy law on notices and arrears.
- Bank details belong in your tenancy agreement or an invoice, not in a text. The “how to pay” line should point to them in words, for example “to the account on your agreement”, so a forwarded message exposes nothing.
This playbook is synthesized: no customer has run it with us yet. If you build it, tell us what you changed, and we’ll replace it with the real version.
Copilot eval
Section titled “Copilot eval”The request used to test the copilot on this playbook (a live eval):
I manage rental flats. Remind tenants by SMS two weeks before their rent is due, on the day, and again if it's late, and give my property manager a task to call when rent is more than a day late and still unpaid. Also email tenants two months before their lease ends and give the manager a task to talk about renewal. The dates are in rent_due_date and lease_end_date, and rent_status says paid or due.
It passes when every piece is a valid draft and everything lands off, with at least: segment, workflow, message_template. It must never use: evict, legal action.