Alex recently got a chance to sit down with Jindou Lee of Happy Inspector after a NARPM meeting here in San Jose. Jindou showed off his company’s product, an online inspection app for the iPad – one specifically built for property managers.  It’s just hitting our shores after a successful debut in Australia. It features easy to navigate fields and checkboxes, a “quick check” feature for signing off entire rooms, flexible note entry and speedy photograph taking.

It’s clear and simple to use, and could be a great timesaver – imagine, while completing a home inspection on your tablet, being able to take a picture of a damaged item, attached directly to the room in which it occurs, and upon completion of the inspection, being able to email a pdf of the report to anyone you wished – with the pictures included.  If you’re currently going back to the office after a day of inspections, and having to type your notes into the computer, you know how much work you’re duplicating.

Also, with cloud storage, you’ll be able to access your inspections from anywhere you have a connection, immediately upon completion, stored securely, and available years later when you’re doing your move-out inspection. Have an iPad with 4G?  That means you probably have a connection in the very house you’re inspecting.

They offer a free trial, so if you’ve got an iPad, there’s no reason not to check it out.

Here at Fourandhalf, we review all kinds of property management technology in various stages of the product lifecycle. The Happy Inspector iPad application is still young but seems to be poised for a quick success. The reason is simple: Simplicity. As Jindou points out in the interview, software simplicity is often overlooked, while complex, difficult applications are often the reason behind many failed implementations. Happy Inspector is very clean and ready to use out of the box. If you don’t believe us, download a free trial and ask your property manager to try it. She’ll thank you for it.

What do you think?

Fourandhalf is an Internet and Social Marketing company working exclusively with Property Managers; we also publish a technology blog dedicated to the business of Property Management.