Tenants in some of the Boston area’s premier rental communities will soon have a new version of the old excuse “the rent check’s in the mail.” Now, many will be able to say, “Sorry, my Internet connection is down.”

Collecting rent through an Internet-based platform is just one of a host of new services companies like AvalonBay Communities and Charles E. Smith Residential Realty are hoping will meet the needs of today’s residents of upscale complexes and make their properties stand apart from others.

AvalonBay, Charles E. Smith and Equity Residential are three firms with Massachusetts ties that recently, along with five other national players, inked a deal to provide an intranet service that can be used by residents to interact with one another in addition to the company itself.

The partnership, announced last month, involves Louisville, Ky.-based ElectricStreets.com, a leading national application service provider of intranets for residential communities and Bethesda, Md.-based Broadband Residential, a multi-dwelling unit broadband company owned by Avalon, Smith Equity and the other five aforementioned companies. The deal affects about 455,000 apartment units nationwide.

According to a news release from ElectricStreets, that company will be offering BBR’s property owners private intranet sites, which will be customized for each property.

By logging into these sites – powered through BBR broadband solutions – residents can transact business with their property manager, such as paying the monthly rent. Additionally, through the new service tenants with maintenance requests will be able to make those requests online.

“This is a really big priority for us,” said Don Stocks, vice president of ancillary services for Charles E. Smith Residential. “This provides a unique advantage which can be used as a portal to the Internet for residents, providing links to the management office and neighborhood and property information.”

And if residents are getting tired of having to pick up the phone or walk next door to talk with their neighbors, the latest in tenant technology will allow them to log onto the network to join various clubs within the complex, find a babysitter, set up a golf foursome, or just socialize, according to ElectricStreets.com.

Tenants may also look for dining and entertainment options, and may shop online for local goods and services.

“Our team is focused on providing a national platform of state-of-the-art broadcast video, entertainment services and high-speed data access solutions to multi-family housing communities, and ElectricStreets will be an integral component of this platform,” said Michael Glosserman, chairman and chief executive officer of BBR.

“Our member companies are forward-thinking, and committed to harnessing the power of technology to create a deeper sense of community among their residents and be even more proactive among their residents from a service perspective,” he continued. The BBR-ElectricStreets agreement will create and deliver value for our members, their residents, shareholders and employees.”

With eight leading multifamily real estate property members, BBR is the only multi-dwelling unit, owner-sponsored broadband company providing high-speed data broadcast video and entertainment services to the MDU community.

Among the approximately half-million apartment units across the United States that will be affected by the new Intranet technology are several in the Boston area split among a host of companies.

Charles E. Smith Residential Real Estate, for example, lists among its communities 2000 Commonwealth Ave. near the Chestnut Hill Reservoir in Brighton and Cronin’s Landing in Waltham along the banks of the Charles River.

AvalonBay Communities has several properties in Massachusetts, including Avalon at Prudential Center in Boston’s Back Bay, as well as Longwood Towers in Brookline, and properties in Hull, Lexington, Quincy, Shrewsbury, Westborough, Wilmington and Peabody.

Equity Residential has several rental properties scattered throughout the Boston area and into Western Massachusetts, including Equity Residential at Charles River Park on Longfellow Place in Boston.

Under the five-year deal struck between BBR and ElectricStreets.com, BBR will pay ElectricStreets between $4 million and $5 million in licensing fees and for Web-site customization, according to published reports. The two entities would share any revenue derived from advertising on the Intranets.

Though the idea of an online tenant community has not succeeded in some instances, officials behind the BBR-ElectricStreets deal are hoping the demographics of the populations in their rental communities will make the latest offering an appealing one.

About 80 percent of households in units owned by members of the broadband consortium have Internet access. Additionally, some 90 percent of the residents are under 40 years old and have annual household incomes in excess of $35,000 each.

Properties involved in the intranet agreement are also generally higher-end communities where tenants are used to extra services such as concierge service, health spas and swimming pools, and residents may readily adapt to the online offering.

Rents in the affected communities also tend to be slightly higher because of the added offerings.

“I think this is going to take off in the industry once people see what residents want,” Stocks said. “Our residents are on the go. They’re professional, active people, and they see this service as a benefit.”

On a broader scale, in addition to providing an intranet, the real estate companies involved in BBR are also outfitting their units with overall broadband capabilities.

“Our demographic is young urban people, and many of them run their business from their units now,” he said, citing the need for technological advances. “The home office is where the market is going.”

“Our simple mission is to provide the world’s best residential intranets to the largest audience. And this agreement makes our mission a reality at this point in time and gives us a strong platform to move forward from a leadership position,” said Larry Bouchard, chairman and chief executive officer of ElectricStreets.

Broadband service will be offered at an additional cost to tenants in Smith’s properties, Stocks said. The intranet will be offered free of charge. He added that having services like broadband and intranet would help his company save money in the long run because of lower rates of tenant turnover.

Though the deal was announced recently, residents may not see the actual broadband intranet service for some time because of existing contracts that some of buildings have with other communications providers.

“We don’t have that here,” said a woman who answered the phone at Charles River Park’s offices. “We won’t have anything like that for a long time.”

Stocks said BBR does not expect to outfit its buildings in the Boston market with the service for 18 to 24 months. He added, though, that Smith’s properties would likely be upgraded sooner. “Boston is a priority for us,” he said. “Boston is clearly some place where we want to be. We want to do things sooner.”

He said the demographics of the tenant population, coupled with the technology-driven Boston economy led to the decision to place a priority on the Hub properties.