A platform has been launched to help landlords self-manage their properties, apparently without the need for agents.

Cohab claims that it uses “cutting-edge tools and user-friendly features” to provide an “intuitive self-managed platform streamlines every aspect of the rental management process, from effortless property listings, comprehensive tenant screening and even automated rent collection.”

Publicity material for Cohab claims that it has been designed “to bypass the noise of heavy user tutorials, providing a seamless user experience designed to save landlords time and money when managing their portfolios.”

It allows landlords to create customisable listings, with the ability to update property details, descriptions and photos at no extra cost after the initial listing has been created.

Cohab is free to use, with the ability to add additional – and non-free – features such as listing a property on Rightmove.

It also claims that potential tenants can utilise the Cohab platform to secure a rental property on the spot, ensuring that the process of renting is far smoother and faster than before, with Cohab providing the ability to generate and sign contracts digitally.

The launch statement says: “With 64% of landlords already opting to self manage their properties, Cohab is designed to significantly cut the time, effort and spend required, reducing the process of listing a property, and managing it, to just minutes. What’s more, Cohab also acts as a free to use portal, providing yet another platform to advertise in addition to the existing portals within the rental market space today.”

Founder Saveli Katz comments: “The profit margins of the nation’s landlords have been continuously dented in recent years due to a string of government legislative changes and, as a result, we’re seeing a higher proportion choose to self manage in order to streamline management costs.

“The issue is that this can be stressful and time consuming, requiring them to juggle emails, paperwork and compliance requirements. Time, cost and compliance are the three key pillars that many landlords focus their portfolio around and, with the introduction of the Renters’ Rights Bill this year, the strains of these obligations are only going to grow all the larger.

“Despite this, to date, there has been no real technology offering designed to lighten the load of self-management within the rental sector, with platforms such as OpenRent only serving to address one particular issue.

“We’ve decided to address this issue and, having already built a bespoke property management system, we’ve now driven our innovation of the sector to new heights with the launch of our self-management offering. It’s a complete, end-to-end software platform that streamlines every single aspect of the lettings process, ensuring that our users can quickly and seamlessly manage their portfolio whilst also remaining fully compliant.

“We’re extremely proud of what we’ve managed to achieve and we can’t wait to see the impact it is going to make on the lettings sector and we’re currently looking for industry partners to help scale our product at speed to bring even further benefit to the nation’s self-managing property owners.”