"Our agreement with Bank of America Merrill Lynch will help accelerate our growth by combining our rent and lease payments platform with Bank of America Merrill Lynch's banking services to create the industry's premier financial services offering to the highly fragmented multi-family housing sector"

"PropertyBridge's singular focus on the multi-family housing industry has allowed it to build the industry's leading payments platform," said Greg Waltz, vice president and general manager of Payment Products at MoneyGram International. "Our agreement with Bank of America Merrill Lynch will help accelerate our growth by combining our rent and lease payments platform with Bank of America Merrill Lynch's banking services to create the industry's premier financial services offering to the highly fragmented multi-family housing sector," added Waltz.

According to the National Multi-Housing Council, nearly one-third of Americans rent their housing, representing 18 million apartments with approximately $146 billion spent annually on residential rent- and lease-related payments in the U.S. As the volume of rent checks increases, today's property managers are challenged with how to centralize and streamline payments, reduce fraud and improve collections while also providing residents with multiple payment options.

The agreement enables Bank of America Merrill Lynch to leverage PropertyBridge's expertise and long-standing relationships in the multi-family housing industry to offer a vertical payment solution uniquely designed to serve the needs of property managers—needs that are evolving due to the growing movement to automate rent payments in an industry still heavily reliant on paper checks. As part of this agreement, credit card processing will be performed by Bank of America Merchant Services in connection with PropertyBridge's custom technology.

The PropertyBridge platform provides a suite of payment options including credit cards, check scanning, ACH, and electrectrd electronic check acceptance. Renters can use the PropertyBridge solution to make payments through multiple payment channels—online, by phone, or in the rental office. In addition to providing renters with more options for making a payment, PropertyBridge's solution serves the needs of property managers with a number of key features, such as:

* a single web-based interface to access comprehensive payment options
* integration of payment data with back-end accounting systems
* compliance with industry-specific rules and regulations
* marketing and adoption programs to boost resident payment adoption

"Our relationship with Bank of America Merrill Lynch demonstrates our ability to provide financial institutions with a unique opportunity to increase deposit income and extend long-term relationships in the lucrative property management vertical. We look forward to a successful relationship with Bank of America Merrill Lynch and are excited about the potential to expand our presence throughout the financial institution channel," said Vicki Keller, vice president of PropertyBridge.