Lawrence H. Fisch, president of Boston’s Preferred Properties, located at 57 Gainsborough St. in Boston, is the architect of a new property management tool that functions like a multiple listing service for residential rentals.

A local real estate broker is set to offer a new online service that makes it easier for landlords, agents and brokers to manage and market rental listings and transactions – a service that local property managers say is very much needed and long overdue.

Lawrence H. Fisch, president of Boston’s Preferred Properties, plans to unveil the new Web site, www.zaplistings.com, which will act like a statewide multiple listing service for residential rental properties, on May 1.

Both landlords and brokers will be able to log in to the service and enter various bits of information – including availability, property location and description and rental policies – constantly updating it whenever and wherever they’d like to.

The service also will allow landlords and brokers to instantly communicate with each other “effortlessly and efficiently” without the need for repetitive phone calls and faxes, according to Fisch.

A landlord using the system will be able to maintain property updates in one central location. Like an interactive electronic filing system, the program also keeps a running list of communication for deals and allows landlords and brokers to keep in contact via e-mail.

Currently, landlords who want to rent apartments typically send listings via fax to various brokers and real estate offices that are then distributed to agents in sales offices. That means that dozens, if not hundreds, of agents are handling the same listings and are making calls to landlords or property managers asking similar questions about availability, utilities, parking and other issues.

In some cases, because of a delay in communication, agents are showing apartments that have already been rented.

The new service will likely eliminate those types of pitfalls for participants, saving them time and preventing the hassles inherent in the old system, said Fisch.

Market Shift

The Web site comes at a time when the rental market in Greater Boston is changing – with landlords competing for the attention of young tenants as colleges and universities are busy building new state-of-the-art dormitories.

“The product that we’re looking at now, I believe, will be very welcome in this market because this market has changed considerably [from] where it was only just a few years ago,” said Fisch. “There are a number of different catalysts that have affected the real estate market on a rental basis. An example of one of the catalysts would be the amount of dormitory beds that have been created and that are in the existence today that were not in existence only a few years ago.”

Donna Brodigan, a property manager with State Financial Services, a real estate management company with more than 500 rental units in Boston and Peabody, echoed Fisch’s remarks. The rental market has slowed with the creation of new dorms erected by Boston University and Northeastern University and with the economic downturn. Nowadays, apartments are taking longer to rent than they did before the universities added the new dormitories, she said.

The new system will be a big timesaver and will give agents exposure to a greater number of units all over the city, Brodigan said. Agents will be able to sort through more listings according to price, size and availability date, she said.

“It’s great. It’s like a multiple listing service for apartments,” she said. “I can’t believe no one thought of it earlier.”

Already, Fisch has done presentations for about 15 large property owners as part of his marketing research.

Keith Beardsley, director of property management at Boston-based Heath Properties, has tested the program and believes it will be helpful.

Currently, Heath Properties faxes listings, often of dozens of vacant apartments, with very basic information. The company manages more than 300 units for different landlords. Sometimes there’s a delay in the time it takes for agents to get the listings, and employees at Heath Properties are constantly answering phone calls and inquiries about vacant properties.

With the new system, listings – with a lot of detailed information and even photographs – are available instantly, said Beardsley. The only delay will be in the time it takes the property management company or landlord to change or input information.

“It’s direct communication,” said Beardsley. “Anyone can look at our listings online and see what we have on a minute-by-minute basis.”

When a landlord logs into the system, he or she can check unread messages or select from a menu of various options. For example, a landlord can enter a new property that is just coming on the market and include very specific information like whether utilities are included with the rent, and check off various features and amenities of the apartment. The site even allows landlords to exhibit photographs of the apartment and add a list of brokers and rental offices that should be given access to the information.

Brokers also can log in to get information about available property listings. The brokerage offices that are granted access to the landlord’s listings will see the rental listings instantly when a query is done for a client. An agent can then enter information about prospective tenants who are interested. A broker/owner can supervise deals that rental agents in their office are handling. That information is then communicated to the landlord.

Beardsley, who said Heath Properties is interested in using the system, acknowledged that it may be challenging to get a real estate office to embrace a service that has been created by a competitor.

The success of the program will largely hinge on getting as many real estate offices as possible to subscribe or enroll in the service, he said. But Beardsley said that Fisch has developed a good product and has the marketing skills to sell it.

“It really is a benefit to everyone,” he said. “If it is used the way it is intended it will really help the real estate industry.”

Fisch started working on the Web program about seven years ago. In the early 1990s, he designed the precursor to zaplistings.com, which was basically an internal management system that was run in his brokerage office. That program provides listing tools and allows rental agents at Boston’s Preferred Properties to merge rental client needs with available property listings. The system also acted as a transaction management tool.

The program quickly became an important part of the Boston’s Preferred Properties, and Fisch wanted to expand it to provide the rental real estate market a forum for handling rental transactions between property owners and real estate offices.

Fisch assembled a team and developed zaplistings.com. He is unveiling the first version of it this week and will be offering a free two-month trial period for landlords and brokers who are interested in opening an account.

A brokerage office can get two accounts for $280 a month and agents will be charged $50 a month for access. Landlords and property management companies are billed according to how many units they are advertising.

A landlord with one unit, for example, must pay only $5 a year, while a person owning 151 to 300 units would pay $300 a year. Real estate property management companies with up to 600 units pay $87 a month, while those managing more than 1,000 would be charged $124 a month.

Subscribers will be required to take a 90-minute class to learn how to use the program. Fisch plans to offer classes several times a day.

Some property managers, like State Financial Services’ Brodigan, are anxious to start using the system. Brodigan plans to take a class in the next few days to learn how to use the service.

“It’s [zaplistings.com] something that should have come out a long time ago,” she said.

Beardsley also praised the service, saying nothing comparable is currently available. While the service is designed for both small- and large-property owners, Beardsley said it is likely to appeal to the larger-property owners and managers who deal with dozens of agents or more.

The big challenge will be getting real estate offices to accept the concept and participate, according to local property managers.

“Getting it implemented and using it online will be the true test,” said Beardsley.