AI for the month-end close: how Darcy's agent works

How the month-end close works today

The close turns a month of activity into statements that owners trust. For a property manager who holds owner funds, a typical close has ten steps:

1. Post all receipts and charges for the month.

2. Enter vendor invoices and accrue unpaid bills.

3. Reconcile every bank account, both operating and trust.

4. Review the general ledger for entries posted to the wrong property or account.

5. Tie out security deposits to the deposit liability.

6. Calculate management fees and other fees under each management agreement.

7. Prepare owner statements with notes that explain big changes.

8. Release owner distributions after reserves.

9. Lock the period so nobody posts to it later.

10. Send reports to owners and investors.

Regulators expect parts of this every month. In California, Title 10, Section 2831.2 requires a broker to reconcile trust account records at least once a month, except in months with no activity. Other states have their own rules. A close that runs two weeks late puts that deadline at risk.

What Darcy does at each step

Darcy matches bank lines, reads vendor invoices, flags anything that does not add up, and drafts the note for each owner statement. The close checklist shows what is done and what is blocking. Darcy's accounting module covers receivables, payables, banking, a general ledger with trust accounts, owner statements and distributions, 1099s, and 112 reports from the ledger.

What your team still does

• Approvals. Every journal entry, adjustment, and distribution needs a person at first.

• Judgment. Is a roof repair an expense or a capital improvement? Your accountant or the owner's accountant decides.

• Fee checks. Management agreements differ. Staff confirm fees.

• Sign-off. The controller signs the close.

How review and approval work

Darcy starts by preparing work for your team to review. In the close, that means matched bank lines, read invoices, flagged items, and drafted owner notes wait in the checklist for an accountant. The accountant opens each item and sees the records Darcy used: the bank line, the ledger entry, the invoice image.

As Darcy learns your policies and your team's decisions, you hand it more tasks to run on its own, one type of work at a time. A team might first accept Darcy's exact bank matches on its own, while partial matches and adjustments stay in review. Owner distributions can stay with the controller. Every action shows the records it used, which also helps when an auditor asks how a number was reached.

Before you start

The close agent works from your ledger, so the ledger needs a clean starting point:

• Review the chart of accounts. Merge duplicate accounts and retire ones nobody uses. A clear chart of accounts makes misposted entries easier to flag.

• Write down your close steps. The checklist is more useful when it matches the order your controller already follows.

• Clear old reconciling items. Uncleared checks from last year make every bank match harder to review.

What to measure

• Business days to close, from month end to statements sent.

• Open items on the checklist on day 3, day 5, and day 10.

• Flags that were real errors, as a share of all flags.

• Correcting entries after the period lock. The goal is zero.

• Owner questions per statement.

Each step has its own page: AI for bank reconciliation and AI for owner statements. For terms, see month-end close and trust accounting. To compare systems, read our list of the best property management accounting software. To see the close checklist on books like yours, book a demo.