Best home inventory app for renters

Your list is shorter than you think, and that's good. Renters insurance is for your belongings. The fridge, stove, dishwasher, washer and dryer, blinds and light fixtures that came with the place are usually the landlord's, and they're the landlord's to insure. Check your lease, and leave those off. Leaving them out makes a renter's inventory a weekend job, not a month.

What you do list: your furniture, electronics, clothes, kitchen things you bought, bikes, tools, and anything in a storage locker or a basement cage. If you bought your own washer or air conditioner, list that, with a photo of its label.

Roommates are separate. Your policy covers what's yours. Keep your list to your things, and if a roommate wants an inventory too, they keep their own.

You move more. Renters often move every year or two, and each move is a chance for things to get lost or broken. An inventory you can carry from one apartment to the next is worth more to a renter than to someone who's lived in one house for twenty years.

NAIC Home Inventory: best free pick for renters who stay put. Free on iPhone and Android, with no upsell. Group things by room or category, scan barcodes and export your list to send your insurer. Reviewers report glitches and failed exports on large inventories, but a renter's list is usually small, which helps. Keep an exported copy anyway.

BoxTrack: best for renters who move often. In BoxTrack, everything sits in a box, and a box can be a room, a closet or an actual moving box. List your bedroom as a box now, and when you move, move each thing into a numbered moving box with a QR label, its photo and values still attached. It keeps used and replacement values and makes a PDF report for your insurer. It runs in your phone's browser and your list is stored online, so a lost phone doesn't take it with it. The downsides: it's new, there's no app-store download, it can't import from another app, and the free plan is 1 box with up to 5 items. A whole apartment needs a paid plan, with a 72-hour free trial.

Codenize: best for sharing bins with roommates. A free iPhone app for bins kept in several places (home, office, storage unit), with sharing for family or roommates. It's about bins and their QR codes, not insurance reports, so pair it with something else for your policy.

Itemtopia: best if your valuables are electronics. It tracks warranties and receipts with reminders, on iPhone, Android, Mac, Windows and the web. Useful when most of what you own is a laptop, a TV, a console and a camera. Insurance reports are on its paid plan, and the free version has a small item limit.

Why not HomeZada? It's a good app, but much of it (maintenance, remodeling projects) is for homeowners, which is your landlord's job. See BoxTrack vs HomeZada if you're weighing it.

1. Moving in the next year? Pick an app that also handles boxes, so you only list things once.
2. Staying put and on a budget? Start with NAIC.
3. Whatever you pick, skip the landlord's appliances, snap the serial-number labels on your own electronics, and keep a copy of the list outside the apartment.

Do renters need a home inventory?

It's worth having one. If there's a fire or a break-in, your insurer asks what you lost, what it cost and when you got it. State insurance departments tell renters as well as homeowners to keep a list.

Should I include the landlord's appliances in my inventory?

Usually not. Appliances and fixtures that came with the apartment belong to the landlord. List only what you own, including any appliance you bought yourself. If you're not sure, your lease and your policy say.

What happens to my inventory when I move?

That depends on the app. Most keep a list by room, which you redo in the new place. In BoxTrack the same things move from room boxes into moving boxes, and back into rooms when you unpack. Our moving inventory guide shows how.

More: how to make a home inventory for insurance.