How Grand Welcome of Orange Beach Automates Bookkeeping Work

‍‍When Luke Brannon left his decade-long career at Warner Brothers Discovery to start a vacation rental business, he knew exactly where he wanted to build it: Orange Beach, Alabama.

In July 2023, Luke purchased a Grand Welcome franchise territory and began laying the groundwork for his vision of a different kind of property management company—one built on efficiency and automation from day one.

The Challenge: Breaking the Growth-Quality Tradeoff

‍In the vacation rental industry, Luke had observed a common pattern he was determined to avoid. "We've seen a lot of small property management companies; they're the owners and the guests love them when they're small. Then they get too big, and they don't know how to scale, they don't know how to handle it, and things start slipping through the cracks."

Even with just a few early properties, Luke experienced firsthand how manual financial processes could become overwhelming. As the sole employee managing everything from guest communications to maintenance coordination, important but non-urgent tasks like expense tracking kept falling to the bottom of his list.

"In the beginning I just had a stack of receipts on my desk and I'm like, 'Oh, one day I'll get to those.' Then the end of the month came, and it's like, okay, now I need to charge all these owners."

"I wasn't making it a priority... I'm a one-man band essentially, and I had to do everything else. The urgent versus the important—the urgent always wins."

Building for Scale from Day One

‍Many property managers start with basic tools and plan to upgrade their systems later. Luke deliberately chose the opposite approach, investing in robust financial infrastructure before taking on his first property. His technology-first mindset, shaped by years in the media industry, led him to prioritize scalable systems from day one.

"I didn't want to be in the middle of growing and dealing with all kinds of other complications and then have to figure out, okay, now I can no longer handle this on my own in this manual process. I wanted to do that from the very beginning."

This philosophy extended beyond just financial management. Luke built a lean, efficient operation leveraging contractors and technology rather than expanding headcount. Beyond his sales representative, the team consists entirely of trusted contractors—including a cleaning company with 15 years of experience and a network of maintenance professionals.

"My whole philosophy is let's automate before we hire," Luke explains. "Where we can't automate, hire people to do those tasks. I think that's going to keep us fairly small—we'll be able to grow where it makes sense."

Introducing Topkey: A Foundation for Growth

‍After discovering Topkey through industry events and LinkedIn, Luke was impressed by the platform's rapid development of new features and clear product roadmap. He implemented Topkey's suite of tools, including:

• Expense management with automated receipt capture
• Bill pay with owner charge tracking
• High-yield trust accounts
• External credit card integrations
• Direct integration with Guesty and QuickBooks

The transformation was immediate. "What I like now is it's already organized as I go," Luke says. "I can push it right into Guesty and I'm done."

Streamlined Financial Operations

‍Instead of letting receipts pile up, Luke and his team can now instantly capture and categorize expenses. This real-time tracking ensures nothing falls through the cracks—a critical feature as the business grows.

"Now even as we get more properties, my workload isn’t going up. Most of it is automated."

The automated expense tracking has already proved valuable for capturing revenue that might otherwise be lost. In one instance, Luke discovered a forgotten $500 HVAC charge several months after the work was completed.

"I've saved probably a whole year of Topkey fees by just not missing one or two transactions."

Enhanced Bill Pay and Banking Integration

‍Luke has gradually expanded his use of Topkey's features, moving vendor payments and banking operations onto the platform. The ability to tag individual line items on vendor bills to specific properties has streamlined the entire accounts payable process.

"For deep cleans, it's super nice now. I can load the bill in, go to that line item in the bill, charge it to this owner and I’m done."

"Before, I would pay the bill in my bank, then manually update the journal entry and the PMS, which was easy to forget."

"This is way more efficient. I don't have to really have to worry about the manual oversight and potentially missing someone."

Maximizing Returns Through Smart Banking

‍Beyond operational efficiency, Topkey has helped Grand Welcome Orange Beach optimize its banking setup. Given Alabama regulations around trust accounts, Luke uses Topkey's high-yield accounts for Florida properties and operating funds.

"The yield that you're earning on the account is way better than anywhere else," Luke notes. "We're just trying to move everything over to Topkey where we can."

The Freedom to Choose Card Programs

‍One feature that particularly impressed Luke was Topkey's flexibility with credit card programs. Unlike other platforms that force users onto specific cards, Topkey allowed Grand Welcome to keep their existing credit cards while gaining the platform's automation benefits.

"The external credit card integration has been big," Luke says. "Honestly, when you're starting a business, your funds are tight. It's kind of cool to be able to take those outside card points and go on a vacation for free when you really need it while you're starting a business."

Reducing Bookkeeping Costs

‍While Grand Welcome still works with a bookkeeper for specialized tasks, Topkey's automation has significantly reduced the hours needed for basic bookkeeping work.

"Bookkeepers are expensive, unless you're paying an offshore bookkeeper whose knowledge of US tax codes I might not fully trust. But not having to pay the hourly rate for a bookkeeper—I'm saving money there too because we're automating stuff that I don't have time to do, and we're automating things that I don't want to pay for a bookkeeper to do hourly."

Responsive Support Driving Continuous Improvement

‍For Luke, one of the best things about working with Topkey has been the responsive customer support and rapid feature development.

"Most of the time with other softwares, you send feedback or you send the feature request, and it just falls on deaf ears that never happens. But I've been very happy with Topkey... there have been a couple of occasions where I was told ‘let me check on this and I'll get back to you.’ It wasn’t possible but it is now."

A Complete Financial Solution for Franchise Financial Operations

‍As a Grand Welcome franchisee, Luke has found that Topkey perfectly complements the corporate-level financial support. While Grand Welcome corporate handles month-end reporting and reservation-level financials, Topkey manages the day-to-day expense tracking and vendor payments that corporate systems don't touch.

"If you look at what Grand Welcome's doing, and then you add on what Topkey's doing, you kind of wind up with a complete 360-degree view of all the bookkeeping, all the accounting," Luke explains. "Topkey kind of fills the gap where Grand Welcome's not assisting in those things."

Looking Ahead: Positioned for Sustainable Growth‍

With Topkey providing a solid foundation for financial operations, Grand Welcome Orange Beach is well-positioned to achieve its goal of adding 2-4 properties per month while maintaining high service standards.

"We're just trying to grow in a responsible way... I want to do it from the very beginning in a way that scales so that I don't have to figure it out later. Topkey will come along with us."

By implementing scalable financial automation early, Luke has created a framework that will support his vision of sustainable growth—allowing Grand Welcome Orange Beach to maintain the personal touch of a small company while operating with the efficiency of a much larger organization.

To property managers considering Topkey, Luke advises looking beyond just the feature list.

"If you're on the fence about it, just call and have a conversation. When I first signed up with you guys, I'm like, man, that's kind of a steep price. But then as I got further into it, I learned more and more about what I was getting out of it."

Ready to build a scalable foundation for your vacation rental company? Schedule a demo with Topkey today to learn how we can help automate and improve your financial operations.

Topkey is a financial technology company and is not a bank. Banking services provided by Thread Bank; Member FDIC.

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