Best Bank Accounts for Rental Properties (2026)

The best bank account for a rental property is the one that matches the property's legal owner and keeps operating cash, reserves, and tenant funds clearly separated — not the one with the highest advertised yield. No single option fits every owner. Four national fintech platforms, a local bank or credit union, and the account you already have are all defensible answers, and which one is right turns on three gates you clear before you compare anything: who legally owns the property and its income, which rules apply to tenant deposits, and which insured bank will actually hold your money. That second gate settles the question outright in more places than most comparisons admit — in Massachusetts, Chicago, and ten other jurisdictions verified on this page, no national platform here qualifies to hold the deposit.

• Best all-in-one landlord workflow: Baselane — banking, rent collection, and landlord bookkeeping in one login.
• Best for Stessa-centered accounting: Stessa — property-linked accounts inside the accounting you already use.
• Best for multi-entity or team-managed cash: Relay — account depth, permissions, and approvals.
• Best general business checking: Bluevine — breadth for an eligible registered business; landlord tools elsewhere.
• Best for branch, cash, or state-specific deposit handling: a local bank or credit union.
• Best when ownership or deposit rules are unresolved: none yet — settle the owner and the tenant-fund rules first.

Where to start, by situation:

• You self-manage one to a few properties in your personal name or a single LLC → start with Baselane or Stessa; the split is banking-led versus accounting-led.
• Your rentals sit inside multiple entities, or inside a broader operating business → look at Relay or Bluevine, and keep landlord operations software separate.
• You handle cash or paper checks, or want a branch when something breaks → a local bank or credit union.
• Your state or city requires a separate, escrow, trust, or in-state account for tenant deposits → a local bank or credit union for the deposits, whatever you choose for operating cash. Check the jurisdiction table first.
• You live in the building and rent the other unit or units → check the exemption column in the jurisdiction table before assuming a deposit rule reaches you; several of the strictest ones exempt owner-occupied small buildings.
• The legal owner or the deposit rules are still unconfirmed → no provider yet. Opening the wrong account first creates a migration problem.
• Ownership runs through a trust, a partnership, or several entities → talk to a real-estate attorney or CPA before you open anything.

On this page

• The eligibility gate: match the account to the legal owner
• Choose the account architecture before the provider
• How we selected and evaluated these options
• Side-by-side comparison
• What the published plans cost in a year
• Which rental banking shortlist fits your situation
• Best options by use case
• Security deposits, account title, and FDIC: three checks most lists skip
• Where your state's deposit rules rule out a national account
• Open or switch without breaking the books
• Frequently asked questions
• Make the account map, then compare

The eligibility gate: match the account to the legal owner

"Bank account for rental property" is a search phrase, not a product name. It returns two different products: accounts opened directly at an insured bank or credit union, and fintech-administered programs where a software company provides the interface while a partner bank holds the deposits. All four national options here are the second kind: none is itself a bank, and each names in its disclosures the insured institution behind it.

Eligibility therefore comes before comparison. The account must be opened in the name of the legal owner of the property and its rental income — you personally, a single LLC, several LLCs, a partnership, a corporation, or a trust — with the matching EIN or taxpayer identification and formation documents. Whether that owner should be an LLC has lender, insurance, tax, and title consequences of its own, including the risk that a lender treats a transfer of title into an LLC as triggering a due-on-sale clause; get a real-estate attorney's read before you move title, and see whether to hold the rental in an LLC before restructuring anything.

Two more gates apply only in some cases, but are decisive when they do. If you hold tenant security deposits, state or local law may require a particular account type, interest treatment, a trust or escrow form, an in-state institution, or written disclosures — a labeled subaccount is not automatically any of those, and in several states it is not lawful at all. The jurisdiction table below shows where that rules out every national option on this page. If you plan to host short-term, city and county legality, permit, tax, HOA or condo, lender, and insurance gates all sit upstream of banking; no payout workflow clears any of them. Still weighing the two paths? Run the Airbnb vs. long-term rental decision first; the architecture here serves either one.

Four account forms that are not interchangeable. Deposit statutes use these terms precisely, and a provider's marketing language rarely does:

• Separate account — an account of its own, with its own account number, holding nothing else. A nickname or bucket inside a general account is not one.
• Escrow account — an account holding money for a third party under terms that restrict what the holder may do with it. Escrow is a legal arrangement, not a label a platform can apply to a bucket.
• Trust account — an account held by one party for a beneficiary, generally titled to reflect that and generally placed beyond the holder's own creditors.
• In-state requirement — the institution itself must be located in, or accept deposits in, the named state. A nationwide platform's partner bank does not satisfy this for a state it is not located in.
• Commingling — mixing the tenant's deposit with your own money, or with money held for another purpose. Most deposit statutes prohibit it independently of the account form, so "I keep it in a separate bucket" is not an answer to it.

A statute may demand one of these, two, or all four at once, and the differences decide which providers can lawfully hold your tenant's money.

One failure path is worth naming up front, because it has a clean answer. If your ownership runs through a trust or a layered entity that no national platform will title an account to — Baselane's documentation, for instance, states trusts are not supported — you have not run out of options. A chartered bank or credit union opens accounts titled to trusts and layered entities as ordinary business, and the operating-cash question can still go to a platform later under a different owner. What you should not do is open the account in your own name and treat the mismatch as a formality; the title is the thing the rest of this page depends on.

What decides the provider choice, roughly in order:

• Provider structure and the insured bank — who holds the deposits, under what pass-through conditions.
• Owner and entity eligibility — whether your exact legal owner can open and title the account.
• True accounts versus buckets — how many legally distinct accounts you need, and whether a platform's "accounts" are real or organizational labels.
• Tenant-deposit account form — whether the provider can hold deposits in the form your jurisdiction requires, if you hold any.
• Rent and bookkeeping workflow — rent collection, property tagging, accounting sync, exports.
• Money movement — the ACH, checks, wires, cards, cash, and contractor payments you actually use.
• Net cost — plan fees plus transaction charges against realistic time saved; APY is a conditional yield, not a return on the rental.
• Support, security, and exit — human help when something breaks; clean data export if you leave.

Your first action: build the five-fact account map. Before opening any provider page, write down:

1. The legal owner and tax identifier for each property or rental activity.
2. How many properties, entities, and people need access or approval rights.
3. Every security-deposit holding, interest, trust or escrow, in-state, and disclosure requirement that applies.
4. Expected rent or payout volume, average reserve balances, and any cash, check, wire, or card needs.
5. The accounting or landlord software, statements, exports, and accountant access your books require.

The rest of the page moves in decision order: account architecture, selection method, the side-by-side matrix, what a year of it costs, the situation-to-shortlist map, five option profiles, the three checks most lists skip and the jurisdiction table behind them, then a switching sequence that won't break your books.

Choose the account architecture before the provider

Providers change; the structure underneath them shouldn't. Work down the owner-to-books ladder: legal owner → true accounts → buckets → books. Start with each legal owner of rental activity. Give each owner at least one true account — an account titled to that owner, with its own account number and legal standing. Inside each true account, use buckets or subaccounts for organization: per-property operating cash, maintenance and vacancy reserves, tax set-asides, owner draws, and — only where the law permits the form — tenant deposits. Then make every transaction land in your books tagged by property.

Three quick examples down the ladder. One property in your personal name: one business-style checking account used only for the rental, plus a savings bucket for reserves, may be all the structure you need. One LLC: an account titled to the LLC under its EIN — never your personal account — with buckets per purpose. Three LLCs: at minimum one true account per entity; a single account with three nicknames does not match the ownership, however tidy it looks.

The federal baseline is about records, not account counts: the IRS recommends a separate business checking account and complete, consistent books for a business (Publication 583, Rev. December 2024), and Publication 527 sets the recordkeeping expectation for residential rental activity reported on Schedule E, which is where most small landlords report. The goal isn't the most accounts; it's the fewest accounts that match legal ownership and keep tenant funds, taxes, reserves, and operating cash visibly separate. Clear records also support — but do not by themselves create — an entity's legal separateness, which depends on ownership, conduct, documents, and state law, and is a question for a real-estate attorney rather than a banking decision. Banking is one step in a longer first-rental sequence; if you're setting everything up at once, the ordered walkthrough in how to rent out your house puts this step in context.

Bank, fintech, brokerage cash, or sweep: know what you're opening

Four product structures answer the same search, and they are not interchangeable:

Structure	What it is	Who holds your money	What it changes for you
Insured bank or credit union	A chartered depository you contract with directly	The institution itself	Direct FDIC or NCUA relationship; branch and cash service possible
Fintech platform (all four options below)	A software company; banking services provided by a partner bank	The partner bank, and possibly program banks	Coverage depends on pass-through conditions; the platform itself is not insured
Brokerage cash product	A cash feature inside a brokerage account, often swept to banks	The sweep banks in the program	Not business checking; confirm the coverage type before parking rental funds
Pass-through sweep arrangement	Deposits spread across multiple program banks to extend coverage	Each program bank, for its share	Coverage counts per bank, per ownership category, and aggregates with your other deposits there

Verification vocabulary: ask any provider to name, in writing, the insured institution or institutions holding your funds and the conditions on any coverage claim — if it can't, treat the coverage as not verified. The FDIC's guidance on banking with third-party apps explains why the distinction matters.

How we selected and evaluated these options

Who this page is for, and what it is not. It is for a landlord with roughly one to ten units deciding where to hold operating cash, reserves, and — where the law permits — tenant deposits. It is published by Rental Income HQ, which is not a bank, lender, law firm, tax preparer, or insurance agency, and nothing here is individualized legal, tax, or financial advice. The jurisdiction table below states account-form requirements only; deposit caps, return deadlines, itemization, and interest calculations belong to our state-by-state security-deposit page.

Inclusion gates. An option had to be available nationwide in the U.S., document its pricing, eligibility, account structure, and partner bank in current first-party pages, offer an account type relevant to holding rental operating funds, fit a material rental-owner use case, and stand on its deposit products rather than lending. We reviewed each option's own pricing, legal, and help documentation. The review date for every provider fact on this page is July 23, 2026; legal and tax sources were rechecked August 10, 2026. Figures are rechecked on publication day, and rates, fees, and eligibility are scheduled for reverification at least monthly. The deposit-law table is scheduled for review at least semiannually and immediately on a relevant legislative change; the next scheduled review is February 10, 2027.

What we compared. The eight factors listed under the eligibility gate above, in that order. We do not publish a numeric score, and there is no hidden weighting: the matrix carries the facts, and the best-for labels are Rental Income HQ's editorial synthesis applied after them.

Evidence rules. Every provider fact comes from that provider's own current documentation — pricing, legal, or help pages — never from a review site or another provider's comparison. Legal requirements come from the statute or ordinance itself; where only a legal publisher's reproduction of the code was reachable, the row says so and is scheduled for re-verification against the official code before publication. Of the twenty-six jurisdiction rows below, thirteen resolve to an official government source and thirteen to a legal publisher's reproduction; each row states which. Where a provider's own pages conflicted, we used the dated legal disclosure and flagged the conflict in the matrix rather than choosing the friendlier number. Support quality and reliability claims are omitted entirely, because we have no disclosed independent methodology behind them.

Review status. The deposit-handling sections link the governing provision for each named jurisdiction and have not been through outside legal review — which is why every row routes to its statute rather than telling you what to do. Corrections and source challenges go to Rental Income HQ at hello@rentalincomehq.com; we date and log every correction to a legal row.

Considered but not included (as of July 23, 2026): Mercury, Novo, and Grasshopper — category peers without a distinct verified rental-owner use case inside this review's evidence set; national branch banks including Chase, Bank of America, and U.S. Bank — no landlord-specific account product inside this review's evidence set, though a branch bank may satisfy an in-state-institution requirement where a national fintech cannot, which is why the local-institution option below is not limited to community banks and credit unions; consumer high-yield savings and personal checking — not comparable products for entity-owned rental funds; payment apps and rent portals — a payment interface is not an operating deposit account; and every lending product — this site does not recommend loans or mortgages, so financing features played no role in inclusion or ordering.

How this page is funded. Rental Income HQ is supported by advertising and, on some pages, disclosed referral links. No provider has paid for placement, ordering, or inclusion on this page, and compensation never determines what is included or how it is ranked. If a compensated link is added to this page, it will be disclosed here.

Side-by-side comparison

Provider facts below are as of July 23, 2026, drawn from each provider's own pricing, legal, and help documentation linked beneath the table. Every APY is variable and conditional; every plan price is a list price per month, and per-transaction charges sit on top of it. When a field matters to your situation, confirm it on the linked page the day you apply.

Read the matrix in decision order rather than left to right: start at the disqualifier row and strike anything your situation rules out, check the eligible-owner row against your five-fact map, then weigh workflow and accounts before you look at a single rate. The accounts row deserves particular care, because "unlimited accounts," "20 checking accounts," and "50 subaccounts" describe three different things — and only true accounts can be titled to different legal owners.

Comparison of four national rental-banking options and the local-institution alternative — provider facts as of July 23, 2026.

Field	Baselane	Stessa	Relay	Bluevine	Local bank or credit union
Structure	Fintech platform; banking by Thread Bank, Member FDIC, with a program-bank sweep	Fintech platform; banking by Thread Bank, Member FDIC, with a sweep network	Fintech platform; banking by Thread Bank, Member FDIC	Fintech platform; banking by Coastal Community Bank, Member FDIC, plus program banks	Chartered depository you contract with directly
Eligible owner types	Individuals/sole proprietors and common entities; trusts not supported at review	Individuals and LLCs; entity and title restrictions apply	Registered businesses and sole proprietors; documents vary by entity type	U.S.-registered businesses; eligibility screening applies	Varies by institution — ask
Monthly plan cost (list, per month)	Core $0; Smart $20	Essentials $0; Manage $12 and Pro $28, billed annually	Starter $0; Grow $30; Scale $120	Standard $0; Plus $30; Premier $95; waiver conditions on paid tiers	Varies by institution — ask
True accounts and buckets	Unlimited checking and savings under supported owners/entities	Unlimited property-linked accounts; up to 3 unfunded at a time	Up to 20 checking accounts per business; 50 on Scale; sole-proprietor limits differ	One checking account with 5 / 10 / 50 subaccounts by plan	Varies by institution — ask
Tenant-deposit account form³	No trust or escrow accounts, per provider documentation	Not published — confirm before holding deposits	Not published — confirm before holding deposits	Not published — confirm before holding deposits	Escrow and trust forms are ordinary products at most institutions — confirm at the branch
APY (variable; conditions apply)⁴	Savings only; tiered up to 2.63%; tier set by combined balance	Up to 1.88% (Essentials/Manage) or 3.24% (Pro); tiered; effective April 1, 2026	Savings 1.11% / 1.75% / 3.00% by plan²	1.3% Standard with activity requirements; 1.75% Plus; 3.0% Premier; balance caps apply	Varies by institution
Deposit insurance¹	Through Thread Bank; provider represents extended sweep coverage	Through Thread Bank; sweep disclosure applies	Through Thread Bank	Through Coastal Community Bank and program banks	Direct with the institution; NCUA rather than FDIC at a credit union
Rent and property workflow	Rent collection, property tagging, landlord bookkeeping	Rent collection plus Stessa accounting and property mapping	None landlord-specific; QuickBooks/Xero sync, roles, approvals	General business payments and subaccounts; no landlord layer	None landlord-specific; digital and export quality varies widely
Material disqualifier	No trust or escrow accounts; state deposit rules may rule it out	Account-title restrictions; personal accounts can't convert to LLC title	No rent or property tools	Not rental-management banking; entity eligibility and paid-tier economics must fit	No rent or property tools; fees and account forms are knowable only at the branch
What this column is not	Not a bank, and not a compliance service for deposit law	Not a bank, and not a substitute for its own accounting product	Not a landlord platform	Not rental-specific banking	Not a nationally comparable option — every value here is institution-specific

¹ Deposit insurance in every row means FDIC insurance at the named bank, not insurance of the platform. Coverage runs up to $250,000 per depositor, per insured bank, per ownership category (FDIC, checked August 10, 2026), can extend across program banks in a sweep arrangement, and depends on pass-through conditions such as accurate ownership records and titling. Balances you already hold at the same banks aggregate toward each limit, and FDIC insurance does not cover the failure of a nonbank platform itself.

² Relay's pricing page displayed conflicting APY values in different modules at review; the figures above follow the dated rate footnote in Relay's detailed disclosure. Confirm the current pricing page before relying on a rate.

³ "Not published" means the provider's own documentation did not state whether it offers a trust or escrow account form as of the review date — not that it does, and not that it doesn't. Treat it as unresolved until you have the answer in writing.

⁴ APY is a variable, conditional yield on qualifying balances. It is not a return on the rental, not a fixed rate, and not guaranteed.

Matrix sources: Baselane deposit agreement, fees, and FDIC disclosure; Stessa banking and plan comparison; Relay pricing and savings deposit agreement; Bluevine plan comparison, fee schedule, and business checking.

What the published plans cost in a year

Monthly list prices understate the decision, because a plan is an annual commitment and two of the paid tiers here are billed annually rather than monthly. Annualized, the published prices spread like this — every figure below is the provider's own list price as of July 23, 2026, multiplied by twelve, with no transaction charges included:

Option	Low case — free tier	Base case — lowest paid tier	High case — top published tier
Baselane	$0 (Core)	$240 (Smart)	$240 (Smart)
Stessa	$0 (Essentials)	$144 (Manage, billed annually)	$336 (Pro, billed annually)
Relay	$0 (Starter)	$360 (Grow)	$1,440 (Scale)
Bluevine	$0 (Standard)	$360 (Plus)	$1,140 (Premier)

One line drives that entire spread: the top tier. Every option here starts at zero, and the free tiers are genuinely usable for a small portfolio — so the practical range for a one-to-four-unit owner is $0 to $360 a year, and the four-figure figures belong to plans built for account depth a small landlord does not need. Read the paid tiers as a features-and-waivers question, never as a fit question.

What this model deliberately leaves out, because the providers do not publish it. Per-payment rent-collection charges for ACH and card, outgoing wire fees, expedited-transfer fees, and — for Bluevine and Relay — the balance and activity conditions that waive a paid tier's fee are all either quote-required or condition-dependent at review. Those lines can exceed the plan fee for an owner collecting rent by card, which is exactly why the per-option questions below ask for them in writing. Any APY you earn offsets cost rather than adding return; it is a variable, conditional yield on qualifying balances, not income from the rental.

Which rental banking shortlist fits your situation

Your situation	Shortlist move	Jurisdiction dependency	Confirm before you sign up or pay
One rental, personal name or single LLC, self-managed	Compare Baselane and Stessa against your existing business checking	Only if you hold a deposit — check the table below	Is your exact owner type and title supported? What are the per-payment rent-collection fees? Which insured bank holds funds, on what pass-through conditions?
Multiple entities or properties with partners or a bookkeeper	Shortlist Relay; keep operations software separate	One per property state, not one per owner	How many true accounts per entity on your plan? What user-permission and approval tiers exist? What does data export look like if you leave?
Rentals inside a wider registered operating business	Shortlist Bluevine	Only if you hold a deposit	Does your business type pass eligibility? Which activity requirements condition the Standard APY? What are the paid-tier fee-waiver rules?
You live in the building and rent the other unit or units	Same four platforms for operating cash — but read the exemption column below before assuming the deposit rule reaches you	Decisive — owner-occupancy is the exemption trigger in Chicago, Maine, New Hampshire, and New Jersey	Does your jurisdiction's exemption cover a building your size? Does your lender's owner-occupancy condition affect the account title? Which entity, if any, holds title?
Out-of-state owner holding tenant deposits	Split the job: a national platform for operating cash, an institution in the property's state for deposits	Decisive — the property's state governs, not yours	Does the property's state require an in-state institution? Can a remote owner open that account? Who is the named account holder on each?
Cash- or check-heavy, or a state-specific deposit-account requirement	Ask a local bank or credit union; open nothing national yet	Decisive where an account form or in-state rule applies	Can it title the account to the exact legal owner? Will it hold deposits in the legally required form? What are the branch, cash, and fee terms?

One scorecard for every candidate. Whichever row is yours, score every candidate the same way: the five-fact account map from the top of this page plus the three checks — title, tenant funds, deposit insurance. Don't grade one provider on its marketing page and another on its legal disclosures; pull the same documents for each.

Best options by use case

The matrix carries the numbers; these profiles carry the fit. Each ends with the two questions to settle before you open anything.

Baselane: best all-in-one landlord workflow

Best for a first-time or growing self-managed owner — personal-name or entity-owned — who wants property-specific checking and savings, rent collection, and landlord bookkeeping in one system, and who does not need a trust or escrow account or an in-state institution.

Why. Baselane is built around the landlord workflow rather than adapted to it: it supports unlimited checking and savings accounts under supported owner and entity types, ties them to properties, and folds rent collection and bookkeeping into the same platform, with banking services provided by Thread Bank, Member FDIC, under its business deposit account agreement. The fit boundary is workflow, not portfolio size — an owner with one unit and an owner with ten can both run the account-per-owner architecture here, because accounts are unlimited under supported owner types; what the platform will not do is decide the architecture for you, so the accounts and buckets you create still have to mirror legal ownership. The free Core tier means that architecture costs nothing to try, and the paid Smart tier — $20 per month as of July 23, 2026 — is a later question of features, not of fit. Interest is earned on savings only, at tiered rates set by combined balance, per its APY documentation — so treat yield as a modest bonus on parked reserves, never the reason to choose it.

Skip if your state's security-deposit rules require a trust or escrow account or an in-state institution: Baselane's own documentation states it does not offer trust or escrow accounts and that legal responsibility for deposit handling stays with the landlord.

Evidence: plan pricing, eligible owner types, account structure, and partner bank verified from provider documentation, July 23, 2026 · trust and escrow forms verified as not offered · per-payment rent-collection charges not publicly disclosed.

Revisit when: you begin holding tenant deposits · title moves into or out of an entity, or into a trust · the partner bank or program-bank list changes · your combined balance at the partner bank approaches an insurance limit in any ownership category.

Before opening: confirm on the current account-opening requirements that your exact owner type — including any trust or layered entity — is supported, and which documents it needs. Then get the per-payment rent-collection charge in writing, including what an ACH costs, what a card payment costs, and who pays it.

Stessa: best for Stessa-centered property accounting

Best for an owner who already runs — or wants to run — portfolio accounting in Stessa and wants cash management living inside the same system: property-linked accounts, rent collection, and books in one place.

Why. Stessa's Cash Management accounts attach directly to its accounting: unlimited property-linked accounts, with up to three unfunded at a time, plus rent collection and automatic transaction feeds, with banking services provided by Thread Bank, Member FDIC. The draw is that categorization, property mapping, and reporting happen where the money already sits, which is worth more to most owners than any rate. The free-to-paid path is also unusually clean: start on Essentials, and move to Manage or Pro — $12 and $28 per month, billed annually, as of July 23, 2026 — only when a specific feature or the higher savings APY tier justifies it, up to 1.88% on Essentials and Manage and up to 3.24% on Pro under the banking page's April 1, 2026 rate footnote. Note the billing cadence when you compare costs: those paid prices assume annual billing, so the real commitment is a year, not a month. The three-unfunded-accounts limit rarely bites in practice, but it does mean you fund accounts as you create them rather than pre-building an empty structure.

Skip if your ownership doesn't fit its account-title rules: Stessa's documentation restricts some entity and trust ownership structures, and a personal account cannot be converted to an LLC-titled account — the title you open with matters.

Evidence: plan pricing, account counts, entity restrictions, APY tiers, and partner bank verified from provider documentation, July 23, 2026 · trust and escrow account forms not published · per-payment rent-collection charges not publicly disclosed.

Revisit when: you open a second entity, since the title you open with cannot be converted · you begin holding tenant deposits · the April 2026 rate footnote is superseded · you outgrow the three-unfunded-account limit.

Before opening: confirm in the Cash Management FAQ that your exact owner or entity can hold the account titled correctly, and which plan the features you need actually sit in. Then ask whether any account form it offers can hold tenant deposits under your jurisdiction's rules, and what rent collection costs per payment.

Relay: best for multi-entity and team-managed cash

Best for owners running several entities or properties with partners, a bookkeeper, or staff — where many true accounts, user permissions, and approval workflows matter more than landlord-specific tools.

Why. Relay is a general business-banking platform, with services provided by Thread Bank, Member FDIC, per its savings deposit agreement. It supports up to 20 checking accounts per business — 50 on the Scale plan — plus granular user roles, approval workflows, and QuickBooks and Xero sync on its published plan structure: Starter free, Grow $30 per month, Scale $120 per month list, as of July 23, 2026. The permission model is the part landlord platforms rarely match: a bookkeeper can see and categorize without moving money, a partner can approve payments above a threshold, and each entity's accounts stay walled off from the others while remaining visible in one login. For a three-LLC portfolio with a bookkeeper, that combination — real accounts per entity plus controlled access — is the decisive feature set, and it is the correct answer to the "five unrelated logins" problem that pushes multi-entity owners toward sloppy shortcuts.

Skip if you want the platform to run the rental itself: Relay has no rent collection, property tagging, or landlord bookkeeping — you'd pair it with separate landlord operations software and decide up front which system is the ledger of record.

Evidence: plan pricing, account counts by structure, integrations, and partner bank verified from provider documentation, July 23, 2026 · APY carried a source conflict across the provider's own modules and follows the dated disclosure (footnote 2) · trust and escrow account forms not published.

Revisit when: you add or dissolve an entity, since account limits are per business · a bookkeeper or partner joins or leaves · the disputed APY presentation is corrected · you begin holding tenant deposits.

Before opening: confirm the account limits for your structure — checking-account counts differ for sole proprietors — and confirm the current savings APY on the dated pricing disclosure. Then ask whether any account it offers can hold funds in a form your state's deposit rules accept, and what outgoing wires and same-day payments cost.

Bluevine: best general business checking

Best for an eligible U.S.-registered business that wants one broad business-checking platform — payments, subaccounts, and yield options — and is comfortable keeping every landlord-specific function elsewhere.

Why. Bluevine's published plan structure — Standard free, Plus $30 per month, Premier $95 per month as of July 23, 2026, with fee-waiver conditions on the paid tiers — offers up to 5, 10, or 50 subaccounts by plan and broad payment features. Read the subaccounts correctly: they organize one checking account rather than adding true accounts, which works well for purpose buckets inside a single entity but is not a substitute for separate accounts across separate entities. APY is 1.3% on Standard, conditioned on monthly activity requirements, 1.75% on Plus, and 3.0% on Premier, with balance caps — so treat the Standard rate as a conditional bonus, and treat the paid tiers as a fee-waiver math problem: they only make sense if your balances and activity reliably clear the waiver conditions. Banking services are provided by Coastal Community Bank, Member FDIC, with deposits swept across program banks.

Skip if you want rental-management banking: Bluevine has no rent collection or property layer, and eligibility screening applies — your business type, documentation, and the paid-tier economics all have to fit before its breadth is worth anything to a landlord.

Evidence: plan pricing, subaccount counts, APY levels and balance caps, fee schedule, and partner bank verified from provider documentation, July 23, 2026 · paid-tier waiver thresholds condition-dependent and not fully disclosed · trust and escrow account forms not published.

Revisit when: your monthly balances or activity stop clearing a waiver condition · your business type or entity structure changes · you begin holding tenant deposits · you need true accounts rather than subaccounts.

Before opening: confirm your business type passes Bluevine's current application requirements and — if the Standard APY matters to you — exactly which monthly activity requirements condition it. Then price the transactions you actually run against the published fee schedule, because the paid tiers only pay for themselves if the waiver conditions hold every month.

A local bank or credit union: best for cash, branch service, and state-mandated deposit forms

Best for an owner who takes cash or paper checks, wants a person to talk to when something breaks, or holds tenant deposits in a jurisdiction that requires a separate, escrow, trust, interest-bearing, or in-state account. For a large share of the country's rental markets, this is not a preference — it is the only compliant answer for the deposit itself. A branch of a national bank can serve the same purpose where the requirement is simply that the institution be located in the state.

Why. A chartered bank or credit union is the institution, not an interface in front of one: the deposit-insurance relationship is direct, cash and paper checks are routine, and the account can usually be titled and structured to whatever a statute demands, because landlord-tenant deposit accounts, escrow accounts, and trust accounts are ordinary products at an institution that has to comply with its own state's rules. That flexibility is the whole case. It also means the operating-cash question and the deposit question can have different answers — nothing stops you running rent collection on a national platform while a local institution holds the deposits in the required form. Credit unions are insured by the National Credit Union Administration rather than the FDIC, so confirm which applies and at what limit before relying on any coverage figure.

Skip if you want the platform to run the rental: local institutions rarely offer rent collection, property tagging, or landlord bookkeeping, digital and export quality varies widely, and nothing here can tell you a given institution's fees or whether it will open the account form you need — those facts exist only at the branch.

Evidence: every consequential field is institution-specific and cannot be verified nationally — pricing, eligible owner types, account counts, and account forms are all marked "varies by institution" in the matrix for that reason, not because they were not researched.

Revisit when: you move a property to another state · the institution changes its fee schedule or drops the account form you rely on · you consolidate operating cash onto a national platform and need to re-check which account holds the deposit.

Before opening: bring the five-fact map and ask two things in writing. Can it title the account to your exact legal owner, and will it hold tenant deposits in the specific form your statute or ordinance requires — separate, escrow, trust, interest-bearing, in-state, whichever applies? Then ask what monthly fees, transaction limits, cash-handling terms, and online-access and export tools come with the account.

Security deposits, account title, and FDIC: three checks most lists skip

The three-check card

1. Account title: the account must be owned by the same legal person or entity that owns the property and the rental income. If title and account don't match, fix the mismatch before optimizing anything else.
2. Tenant funds: your state or city may dictate the account form itself. A provider's "deposit" label is not evidence of legal compliance.
3. Deposit insurance: FDIC insurance belongs to banks, not platforms. A fintech's coverage claim means deposits placed at insured partner or program banks, subject to pass-through conditions and aggregation with your other balances at those banks.

The account-title check quietly decides everything downstream: eligibility, documents, bookkeeping, taxes, and whether the account supports or undermines an entity's separateness. Some platforms restrict which owners they support or lock the title at opening — the matrix's disqualifier row flags the ones that do.

The tenant-funds check is the one with teeth, and it is worth being blunt about why. A security deposit is the tenant's money that you are holding, not yours, and the statutes are written that way: they tell you where the money must sit, who it belongs to while it sits there, and what happens if you get it wrong. Getting it wrong is not a paperwork problem. Depending on the jurisdiction, mishandling a deposit can cost you the right to deduct anything at all, trigger statutory damages, and shift the tenant's attorney's fees onto you — in Massachusetts, failing to hold the deposit in a qualifying separate account is one of the violations that carries treble damages plus fees, and in Chicago the ordinance sets damages at twice the deposit plus interest. The tax code treats it the same way: a security deposit isn't rental income when you receive it if you plan to return it, and becomes income only in the year you keep part or all of it (Publication 527). What this page can say generally: a virtual subaccount is an organizational label unless the provider documents otherwise, and at least one shortlisted provider states plainly that it offers no trust or escrow accounts. If the answer for your jurisdiction is unclear, that is a question for a landlord-tenant attorney or your state's housing or consumer-protection agency before you move any tenant money.

The deposit-insurance check has a precise shape. The standard maximum is $250,000 per depositor, per insured bank, per ownership category. When a platform advertises higher aggregate coverage, it is describing a sweep across multiple program banks: each bank contributes its own coverage, your existing deposits at those same banks aggregate toward each limit, and the whole arrangement depends on pass-through conditions such as accurate ownership records for the actual owners of the funds. Which ownership category your personal and business balances fall into depends on how the funds are legally owned — the FDIC's rules decide, not the app's marketing — which is one more reason the account title has to be right. And none of this covers the failure or record-keeping breakdown of the nonbank platform itself. Read a headline number like "up to $3 million" as conditional shorthand for that structure, never as a flat guarantee. This is also live regulatory territory rather than settled ground: in October 2024 the FDIC proposed a recordkeeping rule for custodial accounts with transactional features that would require insured institutions to keep records identifying the beneficial owners of exactly this kind of pooled arrangement and the balance attributable to each. It is a proposal, not law; we could not confirm a final rule as of August 10, 2026, and the reason it matters to you is that the recordkeeping it addresses is the same recordkeeping pass-through coverage already depends on.

When two platforms share one bank. Three of the four national options on this page name the same partner institution, Thread Bank. Coverage is per depositor, per insured bank, per ownership category — so accounts held at two different platforms that sit on the same partner bank share one limit in each category, not two. Sweep arrangements can spread balances across additional program banks, but program-bank lists can overlap too, and any deposits you already hold directly at those banks aggregate as well. Diversifying across platforms is not the same as diversifying across banks. If your reserves approach a limit, ask each provider for its current program-bank list in writing and compare the lists rather than the logos.

All three checks share one habit: get the answer in writing before you fund the account. The exact title the provider will print, the deposit forms it supports and disclaims, and the named insured institutions behind it are all documentable facts — a provider that can't document them has answered the question anyway.

Where your state's deposit rules rule out a national account

Most banking comparisons treat "check your state law" as the end of the sentence. Here is the beginning of the answer, for the jurisdictions verified on this page as of August 10, 2026.

Read the table with two questions in mind, in this order. First: does this rule reach me at all? Several of these statutes exempt exactly the owner this site is written for — the landlord living in the building, or the individual owning a handful of units — and the exemption column comes before the verdict for that reason. Second: can any national platform legally hold this deposit? Two things make that answer no. The first is an account-form requirement — a separate, escrow, or trust account, rather than a bucket inside a general account. The second is an in-state institution requirement, which no nationwide fintech partner bank satisfies for a state it isn't located in. Either one on its own is disqualifying.

Tenant-deposit account-form and in-state-institution requirements, by jurisdiction — legal sources verified August 10, 2026.

Jurisdiction	Separate, escrow, or trust account required?	Institution must be in-state?	Who is exempt	Can a national fintech platform hold the deposit?	Governing provision and verification
Alabama	No — the deposit statute imposes no account-form requirement	No	No unit-count or owner-occupancy exemption located	Usually yes, if the provider's own terms allow it	Ala. Code §35-9A-201 — verified with limitation (legal publisher's reproduction)
Alaska	Yes — a trust account at a bank, savings and loan, or licensed escrow agent, wherever practicable; deposits may be pooled but never mixed with other funds	No	None located	Only with a dedicated trust account	AS 34.03.070(c) — verified with limitation
California	No — the deposit statute imposes no account-form requirement	No	None located	Usually yes, if the provider's own terms allow it	Cal. Civ. Code §1950.5 — verified with limitation
Chicago, Illinois (city ordinance)	Yes — federally insured and interest-bearing, never commingled with the landlord's assets	Yes — an institution located in Illinois	Dwelling units in owner-occupied buildings of six units or fewer are excluded from the ordinance; Illinois statewide deposit acts may still apply	No	Chicago Muni. Code §5-12-080(a)(1); exclusion at §5-12-020(a) — verified (official code)
Connecticut	Yes — an escrow account, not reachable by the landlord's creditors	Yes — a financial institution located in Connecticut	None located	No	Conn. Gen. Stat. §47a-21 — verified with limitation
Delaware	Yes — an escrow account designated as a security-deposits account and not used in the landlord's business	Yes — a federally insured institution with an office accepting deposits in Delaware	None located	No	25 Del. C. §5514(b) — verified with limitation
District of Columbia	Yes — an interest-bearing escrow account held in trust, for the sole purpose of holding deposits	Yes — a financial institution in the District	Federal and District agency units are outside the section	No	14 DCMR §308.3 — verified with limitation (regulation publisher's reproduction)
Florida	Yes — a separate account, interest-bearing or not; a surety bond is the alternative	Yes — a Florida banking institution	None located	No	Fla. Stat. §83.49(1) — verified (official, 2025 statutes)
Georgia	Yes — an escrow account established only for that purpose; a surety bond is the alternative	No — any bank or lending institution regulated by Georgia or a U.S. agency	Natural persons who, with spouse and minor children, own ten or fewer rental units — unless a third party performs management, including rent collection, for a fee	Only if it will open a dedicated escrow account	O.C.G.A. §44-7-31; exemption at §44-7-36 — verified with limitation
Iowa	Partly — deposits must sit in a federally insured bank, savings and loan, or credit union and may not be commingled with the landlord's personal funds; a trust account is permitted, not required	No	None located	Usually yes, if kept clear of personal funds and the provider's terms allow it	Iowa Code §562A.12(2) — verified (official)
Kentucky	Yes — an account used only for that purpose, with its location and account number disclosed to the tenant	No — any bank or lending institution regulated by Kentucky or a U.S. agency	Kentucky's landlord-tenant act applies only where a city or county has adopted it	Only with a deposit-only account whose location it will disclose	KRS 383.580(1) — verified (official)
Maine	Yes — an account at a bank or financial institution on terms placing the deposit beyond the landlord's creditors; one account may hold every tenant's deposit	No	Tenancies in owner-occupied structures of five or fewer dwelling units	Only with an account whose terms place the deposit beyond the landlord's creditors	14 M.R.S. §6038; exemption at §6037 — verified (official)
Maryland	Yes — an account devoted exclusively to security deposits, bearing interest	Yes — a branch located in Maryland	None located	No	Md. Real Prop. §8-203 — verified with limitation
Massachusetts	Yes — a separate interest-bearing account placed beyond the claims of the landlord's creditors	Yes — a bank located within the Commonwealth	None located	No	M.G.L. c.186 §15B — verified (official); amended effective August 1, 2025
Michigan	Partly — the deposit goes into a regulated financial institution and the tenant must be told that institution's address; a landlord may use the funds only by posting a bond with the Secretary of State	No	None located	Usually yes, if the provider will name the institution in writing	MCL 554.604 — verified (official)
Missouri	Yes — held in trust and deposited in an account in the trustee's name at a federally insured bank, credit union, or depository institution; no commingling	No	Landlords licensed as real-estate brokers follow the broker escrow rules instead	Only with an account it will title to a trust	§535.300(2) RSMo — verified (official)
New Hampshire	Yes — held in trust and never mingled with the landlord's own money	Yes, in practice — the statute's pooled-account safe harbor requires a bank, savings and loan, or credit union organized under New Hampshire law; a New Hampshire bond posted with the city or town clerk is the alternative	RSA 540-A:5 sets exemptions, including for certain owner-occupied buildings — confirm the section's exact terms for your building	No	RSA 540-A:6(II) — verified (official)
New Jersey	Yes — held in trust, never mixed with the landlord's own property; landlords with fewer than ten units use an interest-bearing account at a federally insured, New Jersey or federally chartered institution	Yes for landlords with fewer than ten units	Owner-occupied premises with not more than two rental units — unless the tenant invokes the Act by 30 days' written notice	No	N.J.S.A. 46:8-19; NJ DCA Security Deposit Bulletin — verified (official state agency guidance)
New York	Yes — held in trust as the tenant's money, never mingled with the landlord's	Yes where the deposit is placed in a banking organization — it must have a place of business in the state	Landlords of non-rent-regulated buildings with fewer than six units need not place the deposit in a bank at all, though the trust and no-commingling duties still apply	No	N.Y. Gen. Oblig. Law §7-103 — verified with limitation
North Carolina	Yes — a trust account; a surety bond is the alternative	Not directly, but a trust account held outside North Carolina requires a bond	None located	Only with a dedicated trust account, and only with a bond if held out of state	N.C.G.S. §42-50 — verified (official)
North Dakota	Yes — a federally insured interest-bearing savings or checking account held for the tenant's benefit	No	None located	Only with an interest-bearing account held for the tenant's benefit; most platform checking is not interest-bearing	N.D.C.C. §47-16-07.1(1) — verified with limitation
Oklahoma	Yes — an escrow account for the tenant	Yes — maintained in the State of Oklahoma	None located	No	Okla. Stat. tit. 41 §115(A) — verified with limitation
Pennsylvania	Yes — an escrow account, for deposits over $100	No — but the institution must be regulated by the Federal Reserve Board, the Federal Home Loan Bank Board, the Comptroller of the Currency, or the Pennsylvania Department of Banking	None located	Only if it will open an escrow account	68 P.S. §250.511b — verified with limitation
Tennessee	Yes — an account used only for that purpose, with the institution's location disclosed to the tenant	No — any bank or lending institution regulated by Tennessee or a U.S. agency	None located on the face of the section	Only with a deposit-only account whose institution it will name	T.C.A. §66-28-301(a) — verified with limitation
Texas	No — Chapter 92, Subchapter C imposes no account-form requirement	No	None located	Usually yes, if the provider's own terms allow it	Tex. Prop. Code §§92.101–92.111 — verified (official)
Washington	Yes — a trust account, or a licensed escrow agent	Yes — a financial institution or licensed escrow agent located in Washington	None located	No	RCW 59.18.270 — verified (official)

What this table is not. It is not a guide to deposit caps, return deadlines, itemization, or interest owed — those are a different question and live on the state-by-state deposit page linked below. It is not legal advice, and it is not a substitute for reading your own statute: every row links the governing provision so you can. And a "yes" in the first column tells you the form the money must sit in, never how much you may collect or how long you may hold it.

Scope, stated plainly. This table covers twenty-four states, the District of Columbia, and one city. It is not a fifty-state table. The jurisdictions not verified here are Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois at the statewide level, Indiana, Kansas, Louisiana, Minnesota, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, Ohio, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming — and their absence means unverified on this page, not "no requirement." Read California and Texas as a pair — two of the largest rental markets, neither imposing an account-form rule, which is exactly why national platforms can market to landlords as though the question were settled. It isn't settled in Massachusetts, and it isn't settled in Chicago. Rows marked verified with limitation rest on a legal publisher's reproduction rather than the state's own code site, which was not reachable during verification; the language is consistent across sources, but confirm against the official code before acting on one.

Read the exemption column before you spend money. Four of the strictest jurisdictions here — Chicago, Maine, New Hampshire, and New Jersey — carve out the small owner-occupied building, and Georgia carves out the individual owning ten or fewer units. If you live in your two-flat, the rule that appears to forbid a national platform may not reach your tenancy at all. That cuts both ways: an exemption from the account-form rule is not an exemption from returning the money, from itemizing deductions, or from any deadline, and taking the exemption means the tenant loses the protection the account form was there to provide. Several owners in exempt buildings still use a separate account for exactly that reason.

If your jurisdiction isn't listed, run the same three questions against your state's landlord-tenant statute and then your city's ordinance, since a city rule can be stricter: must the deposit sit in a separate, escrow, or trust account; must the institution be in-state; and is interest owed to the tenant? Your state legislature's website carries the statute, and your state attorney general or housing agency usually publishes a plain-language summary of it. Caps, deadlines, and interest calculations are a different question and live on security-deposit account rules by state. Where you can't resolve it, a landlord-tenant attorney or your state housing agency is the route — not a provider's support desk, which cannot tell you what your statute requires.

Open or switch without breaking the books

Before you switch, check whether you need to. Your existing business checking may already be the right answer: if the title matches the legal owner, deposits are handled lawfully, statements and exports feed your books, and the fees are tolerable, switching adds risk without adding fit. Don't open a new account to satisfy a list.

If you are switching, mid-lease is where clean books usually break. The sequence below keeps every failure findable:

1. Confirm the owner and the rules first. Verify the account title you need and any deposit-handling requirements before you apply. Some programs cannot change the name or EIN on an account after opening, and at least one documents that a personal account cannot be converted to an LLC title.
2. Collect documents. EIN or SSN, formation documents, operating agreement, and ID for every owner or authorized user — requirements vary by entity type.
3. Open and title the account exactly to the legal owner, then build your buckets: operating, reserves, tax set-aside, owner draws, and — only where the law permits the form — deposits.
4. Redirect inflows: rent payments, platform payouts, and any autopay credits.
5. Redirect outflows: mortgage payment, insurance, utilities, contractors, and software billing.
6. Run both accounts in parallel and reconcile. A 30–60 day overlap is an editorial planning suggestion, not a bank rule — long enough for slow debits, deposit refunds, and forgotten annual charges to surface.
7. Export and retain records, then close. Download statements and CSV history from the old account, confirm your books reconcile, and close only after every pending item clears.

Three failures account for most switching pain: a security deposit refunded from the wrong account (step 1), an annual or irregular charge hitting a closed account (the reason step 6 runs 30–60 days instead of a week), and books that silently double-count during the overlap (reconcile both against one ledger of record, not after the fact).

If your rent collection and maintenance workflows live in dedicated landlord software for operations and accounting, or on a short-term path in short-term rental management software, decide before the switch which system is the ledger of record, so the new account feeds it rather than competing with it. No provider makes migration seamless; the sequence just keeps the breakage visible while it's still cheap to fix.

If you've already been mixing rental and personal funds

Plenty of people arrive here two years into an accidental tenancy with rent landing in a joint checking account. That is a common starting point, not a disaster, and it has an order of operations.

Separate the future from the past first: open the correctly titled account and route rent and expenses to it now, before untangling anything historical. Then rebuild the past from statements rather than memory — the IRS expects records that substantiate what you report on Schedule E, and statements plus invoices are the ordinary way to reconstruct them. If the mixing spans more than one tax year, that reconstruction is a CPA conversation rather than a weekend project.

Treat a commingled tenant deposit as the urgent item and handle it separately. In a jurisdiction that requires a separate, escrow, or in-state account, the account form itself is the violation, and moving the money without understanding the statute can create a second problem on top of the first — get a landlord-tenant attorney's read before you transfer it, tell the tenant what you're doing if the statute requires notice of the institution, and keep the paper trail. Nothing here undoes an existing exposure; the point is to stop it growing while you get advice.

Frequently asked questions

Do I need a separate bank account for rental income?

If the property is owned by an LLC or other entity, that entity's money belongs in an account titled to it. For a rental held in your personal name, no single federal rule requires a separate account, but the IRS recommends a separate business checking account and complete records for a business — and lease terms or state deposit rules can add real requirements. There is no universal mandate; there is a strong recordkeeping case.

Can one bank account cover multiple rental properties?

It can, if one legal owner holds all of them and your bookkeeping tags every transaction by property. Separate accounts or subaccounts per property make Schedule E records cleaner, and separate entities generally need separate accounts titled to each entity. The dividing line is legal ownership, not property count — and if you're weighing entity structure for tax reasons, that's a question for a CPA rather than a banking decision.

Can I hold tenant security deposits in one of these platforms?

Only if your state and local rules — and your lease — permit that account form. In Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Florida, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Oklahoma, Washington, and the City of Chicago, the answer is no, because each requires an account form or an in-state institution that no national platform on this page offers; several more allow it only with a trust or escrow account. See the jurisdiction table for the governing provision in each, and check the exemption column — a few of those rules do not reach a landlord living in the building. A platform bucket with a "deposit" label is not a trust or escrow account, and Baselane, for one, states it offers no trust or escrow accounts. Check security-deposit account rules by state for caps, deadlines, and interest before moving tenant money anywhere.

Is money in a fintech platform FDIC insured?

The platform itself is not insured. Deposits placed at its partner or program banks can be, up to $250,000 per depositor, per insured bank, per ownership category, when pass-through conditions such as accurate ownership records are met — and coverage aggregates with your other balances at the same banks, including balances held through a different platform that uses the same partner bank. FDIC insurance does not cover a nonbank's own failure.

How long does it take to open a rental property bank account and switch over?

There's no universal timeline; the slowest dependency sets the clock. Approval depends on your documents and entity type, and redirecting rent, payouts, and autopays — plus a 30–60 day overlap while old items clear — usually takes longer than the application. If you're still launching the rental itself — permits and insurance on a short-term path, make-ready and screening on a long-term one — that's the binding clock, not banking.

What does a rental property bank account cost?

Among the options here, plan list prices run $0 to $120 per month as of July 23, 2026, and all four offer a free tier — but two of the paid plans are billed annually rather than monthly, so check the billing basis before comparing them side by side. Annualized figures are in what the published plans cost in a year. List price is not total cost: add per-transaction charges such as wires, expedited payments, and rent-processing fees, and treat APY as a variable, conditional yield on qualifying balances — not a return on the rental.

Make the account map, then compare

One decision rule survives every provider change: match the account to the legal owner, clear the security-deposit gate, verify who actually holds the deposits, and only then compare workflow and cost. So the next step isn't a signup page — it's twenty minutes with the five-fact map: owner and tax ID, entities and people, deposit rules, money movement, and bookkeeping requirements. With the map done, most owners find the matrix reads itself; without it, every option looks plausible. If the map comes back unfinished — the legal owner unsettled, the deposit rules unresolved, the formation documents not yet in existence — then no provider yet is the right answer, and the providers will still be there when it is finished. And when ownership runs through a trust, a partnership, or several entities, bring the map to a real-estate attorney or CPA before you open anything. The account should be the easiest correctly made decision in your rental, not the first improvised one.

Sources and last verified date

Last verified: August 10, 2026 — legal, tax, and deposit-insurance sources. Provider pricing, plan, rate, and eligibility facts carry their own as-of date of July 23, 2026, stated at the comparison matrix. Next review: provider rates, fees, and eligibility at least monthly; the deposit-law table on or before February 10, 2027, and immediately on a relevant legislative change.

• Publication 583, Starting a Business and Keeping Records (Rev. December 2024) — Internal Revenue Service — recommendation of a separate business checking account and complete recordkeeping for a business.
• Publication 527, Residential Rental Property — Internal Revenue Service — recordkeeping expectations for residential rental activity reported on Schedule E, and treatment of security deposits as income only when retained.
• Deposit Insurance At A Glance — Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation — the $250,000 standard maximum per depositor, per insured bank, per ownership category, and same-category aggregation.
• Banking With Third-Party Apps — Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation — bank versus nonbank distinction, when app-held funds may be insured, and the nonbank-failure gap.
• Pass-Through Deposit Insurance Coverage — Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation — conditions for pass-through coverage, ownership records, and aggregation.
• Recordkeeping for Custodial Accounts, proposed rule, 89 Fed. Reg. 80135 (October 2, 2024) — Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation — proposed beneficial-owner recordkeeping for custodial accounts with transactional features; proposal only, final status unconfirmed.
• Ala. Code §35-9A-201 — Alabama Code (legal publisher's reproduction) — residential security deposits; no account-form requirement.
• AS 34.03.070 — Alaska Statutes (legal publisher's reproduction) — trust account at a bank, savings and loan, or licensed escrow agent; no commingling with other funds.
• Cal. Civ. Code §1950.5 — FindLaw (legal publisher's reproduction) — residential security deposits; no account-form requirement.
• Chicago Municipal Code §5-12-080 — City of Chicago — federally insured interest-bearing account at an institution located in Illinois; no commingling; damages of twice the deposit plus interest.
• Chicago Municipal Code §5-12-020 — City of Chicago — exclusion of dwelling units in owner-occupied buildings of six units or fewer.
• Conn. Gen. Stat. §47a-21 — FindLaw (legal publisher's reproduction) — escrow account at a financial institution located in Connecticut.
• 25 Del. C. §5514 — Delaware Code (legal publisher's reproduction) — escrow bank account at a federally insured institution with an office accepting deposits in Delaware.
• 14 DCMR §308 — District of Columbia Municipal Regulations (regulation publisher's reproduction) — interest-bearing escrow account held in trust at a financial institution in the District.
• Fla. Stat. §83.49 (2025) — The Florida Senate — separate account in a Florida financial institution, or surety bond.
• O.C.G.A. §44-7-31 — Georgia Code (legal publisher's reproduction) — escrow account established only for that purpose, or surety bond.
• O.C.G.A. §44-7-36 — Georgia Code (legal publisher's reproduction) — exemption for natural persons owning ten or fewer rental units, lost where a third party manages for a fee.
• Iowa Code §562A.12 — Iowa Legislature — federally insured bank, savings and loan, or credit union; no commingling with the landlord's personal funds.
• KRS 383.580 — Kentucky General Assembly — account used only for that purpose, with location and account number disclosed.
• 14 M.R.S. §6038 — Maine Legislature — account on terms placing the deposit beyond the landlord's creditors.
• 14 M.R.S. ch. 710-A — Maine Legislature — §6037 exemption for owner-occupied structures of five or fewer dwelling units.
• Md. Real Prop. §8-203 — Maryland Code (legal publisher's reproduction) — interest-bearing account devoted exclusively to security deposits, at a Maryland branch.
• Mass. General Laws c.186 §15B — Commonwealth of Massachusetts — separate interest-bearing account in a bank within the Commonwealth, treble damages and fees for qualifying violations; amended effective August 1, 2025.
• MCL 554.604 — Michigan Legislature — deposit in a regulated financial institution; bond alternative for use of funds.
• §535.300 RSMo — Missouri Revisor of Statutes — held in trust in an account in the trustee's name at a federally insured institution; no commingling.
• RSA 540-A:6 — New Hampshire General Court — deposits held in trust; pooled-account safe harbor at an institution organized under New Hampshire law; bond alternative.
• N.J.S.A. 46:8-19 — New Jersey Statutes (legal publisher's reproduction) — deposit or investment in an in-state insured institution or money market fund, tiered by unit count.
• Security Deposit Bulletin — New Jersey Department of Community Affairs — applicability of the Security Deposit Law and the owner-occupied two-unit exemption.
• N.Y. Gen. Oblig. Law §7-103 — FindLaw (legal publisher's reproduction) — deposits held in trust; banking organization must have a place of business in the state.
• N.C.G.S. §42-50 — North Carolina General Assembly — trust account or bond; out-of-state trust account requires a bond.
• N.D.C.C. §47-16-07.1 — North Dakota Century Code (legal publisher's reproduction) — federally insured interest-bearing savings or checking account for the tenant's benefit.
• Okla. Stat. tit. 41 §115 — Oklahoma Statutes (legal publisher's reproduction) — escrow account maintained in Oklahoma at a federally insured financial institution.
• 68 P.S. §250.511b — FindLaw (legal publisher's reproduction) — escrow account at a regulated institution for deposits over $100.
• T.C.A. §66-28-301 — Tennessee Code (legal publisher's reproduction) — account used only for that purpose at a state or federally regulated institution.
• Tex. Prop. Code ch. 92 — Texas Statutes — residential security-deposit provisions; no account-form requirement.
• RCW 59.18.270 — Washington State Legislature — trust account at a financial institution or licensed escrow agent located in Washington.
• Baselane Business Deposit Account Agreement — Baselane — Thread Bank relationship and account terms.
• How do I open a Baselane Banking account? — Baselane — eligible owner types, trust limitation, and required documents.
• What is the APY on my Baselane Savings Account? — Baselane — savings-only interest, tier structure, and conditions.
• How to Collect and Hold Security Deposits with Baselane Banking — Baselane — no trust or escrow accounts; landlord responsibility for state deposit law.
• How does Baselane make money? — Baselane — plan and fee structure.
• Is my Baselane account FDIC insured? — Baselane — sweep-coverage representation and program-bank language.
• Stessa Banking — Stessa — Thread Bank relationship, account counts, APY tiers, and rate footnote effective April 1, 2026.
• Choose the right Stessa plan for you — Stessa — Essentials, Manage, and Pro pricing and features.
• Stessa Cash Management accounts FAQ — Stessa — eligibility, unlimited accounts, and entity restrictions.
• LLC Cash Management accounts and personal-account conversion restrictions — Stessa — account-title and conversion limits.
• Pricing — Relay — plan prices, account counts, integrations, and the dated APY footnote.
• Savings Account Deposit Agreement — Relay — Thread Bank relationship and eligible entities.
• Required documents to open a Relay account by entity type — Relay — entity-specific documentation and account-count differences by business structure.
• What is Bluevine Premier? — Bluevine — Standard, Plus, and Premier plan structure, subaccounts, and features.
• Does my Bluevine Business Checking account have fees? — Bluevine — monthly and transaction fee schedule.
• Checking interest — Bluevine — APY levels, balance caps, and Standard-plan activity requirements.
• How do I apply for a Bluevine Business Checking Account? — Bluevine — eligible business types and application requirements.
• Business checking — Bluevine — Coastal Community Bank relationship and FDIC representation.