Client: Multifamily owner/operator with properties in four states

Client's Goals: Revamp the company's accounting processes, improve financial reporting, and strengthen investor relations

Our Team's Role: BPO – A/P processing, bank reconciliations, period-end close, quarterly investor reporting, investor waterfall calculations

The client, a multifamily real estate owner/operator with properties across four states, experienced significant turnover in their accounting department, going through four controllers in just two years. This cycle of hiring and training posed a challenge to maintaining continuity in financial reporting and investor relations. Seeking a long-term solution to streamline their accounting functions, the client partnered with Citrin Cooperman’s Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) team to enhance their processes, strengthen financial reporting, and improve overall investor relations.

Challenges

• Disruption of business functions due to employee turnover.
• No documentation of key processes (accounts payable, month-end checklist, payroll, waterfall calculations).
• Clean-up of balance sheet accounts including uncleared items on the bank reconciliations, past/cancelled tenants on the rent roll, discrepancies between balance sheet and key reports (A/R aging, A/P aging, SD liability).
• Low quality investor portal.

Citrin Cooperman's Approach

• Team of accountants assigned to the client by department (A/P, property accountants, investor).
• Created SOPs documenting the accounting processes and made recommendations for improvement.
• Research and review of balance sheet accounts to tie out balances to appropriate reports.
• Assisted in transition to Juniper Square including thorough review of data import and manual calculation to test new software waterfalls.

Results

• Continuity of service to avoid disruptions in day-to-day businesses.
• Documentation of detailed processes and workpapers to be used in period-end close.
• Cleaner set of books more in line with what larger investors are expecting.
• Satisfied investors who can retrieve accurate information on a more user-friendly platform.