Scenario: Leasing an Apartment End to End

This is the whole journey in one story: a single residential lease from the first inquiry to a renewed, occupied tenancy. We follow Aisha Rahman renting Meridian Court #101 at 1,200.00 per month on a 12-month term, with Continental Holdings as the property owner. Each step points to the article that owns the detail — this scenario's job is to show the order and the hand-offs, and above all which records REDA creates for you at each gate, so nothing on screen is a surprise. Read it once and you can map your own live deal onto this timeline and know what comes next.

The story at a glance

Aisha enquires about a one-bedroom at Meridian Court. An agent qualifies the lead and converts it into a lease. The lease is completed, approved, signed, and turns billable; Aisha moves in, pays her rent, and — a year later — renews. Five acts, one record, and at every gate REDA quietly creates the next thing you need. Here is the entire file in a single table before we walk each act.

The timeline

Numbers are the running Meridian example; dates are illustrative, with the lease starting 1 Aug 2026. Each row names the article that owns the step in full.

Act 1 — Inquiry to lease

Aisha's interest is captured as a leasing inquiry — typed by the agent from a phone call, or arriving from Meridian's website with Source set to Web and the marketing attribution filled in (see Capturing Inquiries). Nothing advances on its own after that; the agent works the manual status funnel and qualifies the lead (see Qualifying Inquiries).

The one readiness gate that matters here is that the Move In Date and Lease Term must be filled before conversion — the conversion enforces it at the end, so a miss surfaces as a failed conversion rather than a form error. With those in place, the agent clicks Convert Inquiry. REDA builds the Account, the Contact, the lease Opportunity, and a primary Lessee contact role in one all-or-nothing transaction, drops the new lease at Application - New, and stamps the inquiry Converted. Full detail: Converting Inquiries.

Act 2 — Application to move-in

Now the agent builds the chargebook — rent, deposit, and any application or admin fee (deep detail in Setting Up Lease Charges) — and walks the stage ladder:

Application - New → Application - Completed → Application - Approved → Agreement - In Process → Occupied - Pending Move In → Occupied - No Notice

The two records users most often forget are the ones REDA creates for them: the Lease Agreement ticket the moment the lease is approved, and — when the signed agreement turns the lease billable at Occupied - Pending Move In — the Move In ticket, the first invoices, and (when the unit is configured for it) the move-in inspection. Closing the Move In ticket lands the lease at Occupied - No Notice and arms the renewal cycle. This is the heart of the lifecycle, walked step by step in From Application to Move-In.

Act 3 — The first invoices

This is where new users file the single most common first-month question: "Aisha got two invoices in her first month — is that a bug?" It isn't. On a recurring charge's first run only, REDA can bill the opening (usually prorated) stub period and the next full period in the same run, so a tenant who moves in late in the month isn't surprised by next month's bill a day later.

Act 4 — Living in the unit

With Aisha in residence, recurring rent invoices flow on the Leasing Rule's process day. There is one prerequisite worth stating plainly: the ongoing recurring-invoice job is produced by a background job that ships unscheduled — an administrator must schedule it once, or rent stops generating after the move-in invoices (see Scheduling Background Jobs). If rent goes overdue past the late-fee charge day and the charge code has late fees enabled, REDA accrues a late fee (see How Late Fees Work).

When Aisha pays, the agent uses Post Payment on the lease. REDA owns the receivable, but the cash side belongs to REDA Financials: it posts the receipt and applies it to the open rent invoice, so the invoice's Received rises and its Balance falls, and the lease's outstanding balance drops. The cash truth lives in Financials, not in editable REDA fields (see Posting Tenant Payments and How Payments Sync). This month is examined in close-up in the companion scenario, One Month of Recurring Billing.

Act 5 — Renewal

REDA raised the first Renewal ticket the moment the lease reached Occupied - No Notice (with rule automation on), dated the configured number of days before expiry so the conversation is never missed. Near term end the agent opens it, sets the renewed rent — resolved from the property's rent card Renew Lease amount, which for Meridian Court #101 is 1,250.00 (not the 1,200.00 she pays today) — gets it signed, and closes the ticket. Closing writes the Renewed Till Date to the lease, switches the renewal charges on, and auto-creates the next Renewal ticket. The cycle perpetuates while automation stays on. Full detail: Renewing a Lease.

The numbers, reconciled

Every figure in this scenario is internally consistent and matches the sibling articles it points to:

The Tickets tab of the lease, listing the lifecycle tickets REDA creates as the deal advances — here the auto-created Lease Agreement ticket (T-0000000216, Status New) sits at the top. The Move In ticket follows once the Lease Agreement ticket is signed and closed.

The Accounting tab of the lease, listing its Opp Invoices — the monthly rent invoices at $1,200.00 covering consecutive periods, alongside the CAM work-order invoice.

Where to go next

1. Converting Inquiries — the conversion that starts the lease, in full.
2. From Application to Move-In — the lifecycle heart of Act 2, step by step.
3. How Recurring Invoicing Works — what bills after move-in, and the first-month double invoice.
4. One Month of Recurring Billing — a close-up on Act 4's billing cycle.
5. A Co-living Arrangement with Child Leases — the same journey when the tenant takes a second unit.
6. Renewing a Lease — the Renewal ticket worked through.

Frequently asked questions