Find how much you have
Check which plan you are on. AppFolio's pricing page lists Property Accounting & Reports, Work Order Management, and Inspections & Unit Turns on Core, adds Advanced Data Analysis and a read-only API on Plus, and a read/write API on Max.
Sign in as a user who can see every property in the account. AppFolio's public site does not describe which user roles can run or export reports, so ask your account manager or whoever administers AppFolio for you to confirm your access.
Open your reports and build or run one that lists work orders for all properties, all statuses and all dates. AppFolio says its Report Builder creates custom reports from base reports, lets you add columns from other reports, and that the result can be exported or saved. AppFolio's step-by-step report help sits inside its customer help center rather than its public site, so report names can differ in your account.
Export the report to a file and count the rows. Include completed and canceled work orders. AppFolio's API records a completed date and a canceled date separately, so both outcomes are real history.
For units, start from the Rent Roll. AppFolio's blog lists its columns as Unit, Tenant, Status, Rent, Deposit, Lease Start and Lease End. Check that vacant units appear. A unit count is not your intake number, but it tells a buyer the scale of the portfolio, so put it in the description.
If you are on Plus or Max, a developer can list work orders through the API. Each record carries a property and unit ID, a status, a priority, a vendor and trade, scheduled start and end, and completed or canceled dates, and you can filter by status or last-updated date. The oldest date in that list gives your start, and counting distinct unit IDs shows how many units have maintenance history.
What to put on your intake
Your intake has five boxes for each system. Here is what goes in each one for AppFolio.
- What does it hold?
- Maintenance requests and work orders with property, unit, vendor, trade, priority and status, plus the properties, units, tenants, leases, leasing leads, vendors, bills, charges and ledgers around them. Name the parts your team really uses.
- Data types
- Structured records and Text for work order descriptions and messages. Add Image only if photos or documents attached to work orders are in scope.
- How big is it?
- Report the number of work orders across all statuses. Put your unit and property counts in the description field so a buyer can judge the scale.
- Verified or estimated
- Verified when the number is the row count of an exported report or a total from the API. Estimated if it comes from one property, one year, or memory.
- Records start
- The date of your oldest work order in the export. If you moved portfolios in from another system or acquired properties, say when each came onto AppFolio.
Exporting the full history
If a buyer licenses your records, this is how the full history comes out of AppFolio.
Nothing is exported until you have signed a license and agreed the scope: which properties, which date range, which record types (work orders, units, leases, bills) and whether attachments are in or out.
Run the agreed reports and export each to a file. AppFolio describes secure export functionality for taking data outside AppFolio, and Report Builder reports can be exported or saved. Use the same property, status and date filters you used for sizing, so the files match your intake numbers.
For a larger or repeatable pull, AppFolio says Plus customers can export data into reports, a data warehouse or curated partner integrations, and describes exporting reports and data to downloaded files or a data warehouse. Ask your account manager how a warehouse export is set up on your plan and whether it costs extra.
A developer can use the API on Plus or Max instead. Work orders, properties, units, vendors, tenants, leads, bills, charges and ledgers each have their own list. Have your own employee run it, because AppFolio's terms say third parties may not use the service or its API without AppFolio's prior consent. Ask AppFolio first if you want an outside contractor to do it.
Attachments on work orders are the gap. AppFolio's API page lists uploading an attachment to a work order but we found no matching download, so ask AppFolio how photos and documents can be exported before you agree to include them.
Resident, owner and vendor identifiers come out before anything is delivered to a buyer.
We only ask for an export after you sign a license and agree the scope. Sizing your data for the intake never needs one.
Limits to know
- Leaving AppFolio is a retention cliff. AppFolio's Core, Plus and Max terms each say that after your subscriptions end AppFolio may deactivate the services and, following a reasonable period, delete your account and data, and that you are expected to retrieve your data first. If AppFolio ends the service, you get temporary access of up to 30 days to retrieve it, and only if you have paid all undisputed amounts in full.
- The API depends on your plan. AppFolio lists a read-only API on Plus and a read/write API on Max, and none on Core.
- Third parties cannot use AppFolio or its API on their own. The terms say they need AppFolio's prior consent, even if you invite them. Run any pull yourself and ask AppFolio before involving a contractor.
- No scripts or scrapers. The terms bar using any robot, spider or other automated means to access, retrieve, scrape or index any part of the service, so stick to reports, the API on your plan, or an export AppFolio sets up for you.
- AppFolio's public documentation is thin. Its detailed report help is not on its public site, so we could not verify report names or the roles that can export. Treat the steps above as a map and confirm them with your account manager.
- The Report Builder article we read is dated November 2023, so menu labels may have changed.
- AppFolio's terms say it uses your business data to provide and improve its services and aggregates and anonymizes it into industry reports that may be made public, and that it does not sell your Business Data. The terms also make you responsible for complying with privacy laws for the personal information you put in.
This guide isn't legal advice. Check your contracts, and any recording-consent rules that apply, with your own lawyer.
Why buyers value it
A property management work order links a request to a result. The record shows what was reported, in which unit, how it was prioritized, who was assigned, which vendor and trade did the work, when it was scheduled and when it finished or was canceled. AppFolio's bill records also carry the work order they belong to, so cost can follow the job. Buyers building maintenance triage, vendor dispatch and repair-cost models want exactly that chain, across property types and seasons.
Unit turns and inspections add pattern: the same unit or building failing in the same way, and how fast it was fixed. Years of consistent history let a buyer separate one-off repairs from systemic problems.
What stays private
Buyers see de-identified operating records, not your residents or owners. Under the license, the de-identification step before delivery removes or excludes:
- Residents and applicants: names, phone numbers, email addresses, and anything typed into work order descriptions and messages that identifies a person.
- Access details: permission-to-enter notes, entry instructions, and lockbox or gate codes.
- Owners and money: owner names and statements, bank account numbers, ledgers tied to named people, and security deposit detail.
- Screening and application data: rental applications and the credit or background reports behind them, which come from third parties and carry sensitive personal data.
- Third-party content: vendor contracts, insurance certificates and vendor price lists, which belong to the vendors.
Photos attached to work orders can show residents' belongings and faces, so the license scope decides whether they are included at all.
Common questions
Sources
Vendor documentation, checked . Screens and plans change, so if a step looks different in your account, check with AppFolio.
- AppFolio: Pricing and plans (opens in a new tab)
- AppFolio: Stack APIs (opens in a new tab)
- AppFolio: Property Manager Plus overview (opens in a new tab)
- AppFolio: Workflow automation (opens in a new tab)
- AppFolio: Accounting and reporting (opens in a new tab)
- AppFolio blog: Customizing your reports (opens in a new tab)
- AppFolio: Property Manager Core terms of service (opens in a new tab)
- AppFolio: Property Manager Plus terms of service (opens in a new tab)
- AppFolio: Property Manager Max terms of service (opens in a new tab)