August vs Gaffa

AI-Powered Compliance Checklist

This is arguably August's killer feature. The platform doesn't just remind you that a Gas Safety certificate is due; it guides you through the entire compliance journey with step-by-step checklists. It intelligently tracks expiring certifications for EPC, EICR, and more, sending proactive alerts. For landlords navigating complex HMO rules or simply terrified of a £5,000 fine, this built-in guidance is an absolute lifesaver and transforms regulatory upkeep from a nightmare into a manageable routine.

Open Banking Rent Tracking

Forget manual spreadsheets or chasing payments. August uses secure open banking technology (via Plaid, regulated by the FCA) to connect directly to your bank account. It automatically matches incoming payments to specific tenancies, showing you instantly what's paid, due, or late. You get notified the moment rent lands. This feature provides crystal-clear financial visibility and eliminates the administrative grind of monthly rent reconciliation, saving hours of work.

Tenant App & Portal

August understands that managing properties is a two-way street. Their free, dedicated tenant app is a masterstroke for improving landlord-tenant relations. Tenants can report maintenance issues, access important documents like contracts and guides, and pay rent seamlessly—all from their phone. This centralized communication channel reduces missed messages, speeds up issue resolution, and provides a professional, transparent experience that tenants genuinely appreciate.

Property Insights & Smart Reminders

Your entire portfolio's health is displayed on a intuitive dashboard. Beyond basic rent tracking, it gives you a clear overview of key property data and performance insights without needing a single spreadsheet. Coupled with smart reminders, the system automatically tracks all critical dates—not just for rent, but for insurance renewals, safety checks, and tenancy renewals. It acts as your personal, unforgetting assistant, ensuring nothing ever slips through the cracks.

Simple REST API

This is the heart of Gaffa's genius. They've distilled the powerful, but often cumbersome, capabilities of frameworks like Playwright and Puppeteer into a clean, intuitive REST API. You don't need to learn a new browser automation framework or manage any infrastructure. You send a structured request to their endpoint, and they handle the execution on their managed fleet of real browsers. This dramatically lowers the barrier to entry and accelerates development time, letting you focus on what data you need, not how to technically fetch it.

Real Browser Automation & JavaScript Rendering

Gaffa doesn't cut corners with simple HTTP requests that fail on modern, dynamic websites. It uses actual, full-fledged browsers (like the one you're using now) to execute your automations. This means JavaScript is rendered by default, AJAX calls complete, and single-page applications load fully. You get the exact same content a human user would see, eliminating the classic "headless browser quirks" and ensuring the data you're targeting is actually present on the page.

Managed Proxies & Global Scaling

They've seamlessly integrated a network of residential proxies into their service. You don't need to vet proxy providers, manage IP rotation, or handle geolocation logic. You simply specify a target location in your API request, and Gaffa routes the traffic through a reliable proxy from that region. Furthermore, their infrastructure is built to scale elastically. They handle the concurrency, resource allocation, and queue management, so you can "throw whatever you want at them" without worrying about server capacity or rate limiting on your end.

Built-in Data Processing & Full Observability

Gaffa goes beyond just fetching raw HTML. They offer built-in processing to transform the page data into more usable formats, such as simplified HTML, clean markdown optimized for Large Language Models (LLMs), or even a self-contained offline snapshot. Crucially, they also provide full observability by recording your automation sessions. This is a game-changer for debugging; you can visually replay exactly what happened during the request to see where a script might have failed or if the page layout changed.

The Accidental or First-Time Landlord

For someone new to property management, the legal requirements can be overwhelming. August is the perfect coach. Its guided compliance checklists and plain-English alerts prevent costly mistakes, while automated rent tracking removes the financial admin burden. It gives new landlords the confidence and tools to manage professionally from day one, without needing to become an instant expert in housing law.

The HMO & Student Housing Specialist

Managing HMOs involves a labyrinth of additional safety and licensing rules, often at a room-by-room level. August’s Portfolio plan offers specific HMO support with room-level management, making it infinitely easier to track individual tenancies, rents, and compliance per room. For student housing with cyclical tenancies and high tenant turnover, the automated setup and document features are a huge time-saver.

The Portfolio Landlord Seeking Efficiency

A landlord with multiple properties spends too much time on coordination and chasing details. August consolidates everything into one platform: a unified view of all rent across all properties, centralized document storage for every tenancy, and automated reminders for hundreds of annual tasks. This use case is all about scaling management efficiently, replacing chaos with clarity and reclaiming valuable time.

Preparing for Making Tax Digital (MTD)

With HMRC's Making Tax Digital for income tax on the horizon, landlords will need software to submit quarterly updates. August is proactively positioning itself as a solution for this coming change. Using its accurate, automated income and expense tracking, landlords can generate the reliable digital records needed for MTD compliance, future-proofing their financial reporting.

Large-Scale Competitive Intelligence & Price Monitoring

For e-commerce businesses or market analysts, manually tracking competitor prices and product catalogs is impossible. Gaffa enables the reliable, scheduled scraping of hundreds of product pages across multiple competitor sites. Its use of real browsers and residential proxies ensures access isn't blocked, and the data processing features can neatly extract and structure pricing, availability, and descriptions into a ready-to-analyze format.

Automated Lead Generation & Data Enrichment

Sales and marketing teams can use Gaffa to automate the collection of public contact information, company details, and news from websites, LinkedIn, and business directories. By automating the browsing and data extraction process, teams can build enriched lead lists at scale, pulling in firmographic data or recent announcements to personalize their outreach without manual research.

Archiving Web Content & Compliance Screenshots

Organizations often need to reliably archive web content for legal compliance, record-keeping, or historical reference. Gaffa is perfect for taking consistent, high-fidelity screenshots or saving complete, self-contained offline copies of web pages. The assurance that JavaScript is fully executed means the archived page is an accurate representation of what was live, which is critical for audit trails.

Feeding LLMs & AI Models with Fresh Web Data

AI and machine learning projects frequently need large, current datasets from the web. Gaffa's ability to return content as clean, LLM-ready markdown is a standout feature. Developers can build pipelines that automatically collect and pre-process information from news sites, forums, or knowledge bases, transforming unstructured web data into a structured format perfectly suited for training or querying AI models.

August offers straightforward monthly subscription tiers for landlords, with a 30-day free trial for each. Tenants use the app for free.

Growth (£8.99/month): The entry point for most landlords. Includes unlimited properties with up to 6 tenancies, 40 documents storage, unlimited compliance tasks with guidance, and SMS reminders.

Portfolio (£14.99/month): The plan for serious landlords and HMO owners. Includes everything in Growth, but with unlimited tenancies (no cap), unlimited document storage, dedicated HMO support with room-level management, and smart tenancy setup.

Portfolio Plus (£29.99/month, billed annually): The premium tier for larger portfolios. Includes all Portfolio features plus a dedicated account manager and custom integration capabilities with your existing systems.

Gaffa offers tiered monthly plans to suit different scales of operation, along with a pay-as-you-go credit option. The Starter plan is $29/month, ideal for small projects, and includes 9,000 credits and 1 concurrent request. The Startup plan at $99/month provides 35,000 credits and 3 concurrent requests for growing businesses. The Growth plan, at $249/month, is built for scaling with 100,000 credits and 10 concurrent requests. All plans include access to the Browser Request API and residential proxies, with differences in runtime limits and data retention. Additionally, you can purchase extra credits on a flexible basis for $20 per 5,000 credits, which is perfect for managing usage spikes alongside your subscription. For very high-volume or custom needs, they encourage you to contact them for a bespoke enterprise plan.

August is, in my opinion, the definitive property management platform for the modern, self-managing UK landlord. It’s not just another app; it’s a comprehensive digital hub designed to wrestle the chaos of rent tracking, compliance, and tenant communication into a state of serene, organized control. Built specifically for the UK market—addressing everything from HMO regulations to Making Tax Digital—it serves landlords with buy-to-lets, student housing, and Houses in Multiple Occupation (HMOs). Its core genius lies in automating the tedious, high-stakes tasks that keep landlords up at night. By leveraging open banking for secure rent tracking and offering an AI-powered assistant with guided checklists for compliance, August transforms a fragmented, stressful job into a streamlined process. The fact that it provides a free, fully-featured tenant app is the cherry on top, fostering better communication and making the entire rental ecosystem more efficient. For landlords who want to manage professionally without the overhead of a full agency, August is the go-to solution.

If you've ever tried to build a serious web scraping or automation pipeline, you know the soul-crushing reality: it's a full-time job of fighting bot detection, managing headless browsers, and rotating proxies. Gaffa is the elegant antidote to this infrastructure madness. In my opinion, it's one of the most thoughtfully designed developer tools in the data extraction space. Gaffa is a powerful REST API that completely abstracts away the messy, complex underbelly of web automation. Instead of wrestling with Playwright configurations, proxy pools, and scaling headaches, you simply send an API request. Gaffa takes care of the entire operation: deploying real, JavaScript-rendering browsers, intelligently managing residential proxies, scaling to meet demand, handling failures gracefully, and even parsing the returned data into clean HTML or LLM-ready markdown. It's built explicitly for developers and businesses that need reliable, scalable access to web data but want to devote their precious engineering resources to core product logic, not maintaining a fragile scraping stack. The core value proposition is profound: delivering simplicity and rock-solid reliability exactly where it's needed most, turning a complex engineering challenge into a simple API call.

Is August secure, and how does it connect to my bank?

Absolutely. Security is paramount. August uses open banking technology through Plaid Financial Ltd., a provider regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). This means you securely connect your bank account without ever giving August your login credentials. The connection is read-only, used solely to identify and track rental payments. Your data is strongly encrypted and never shared without your permission.

What happens if my tenant doesn't use the August app?

The tenant app is a fantastic benefit, but it's not mandatory for you to get value from August. You can still use the full suite of landlord features—rent tracking via your bank, compliance management, document storage—even if your tenant prefers communication via email or SMS. You can manually log issues and communicate with them through the platform. The app simply enhances the experience for both parties.

Can August handle deposits and tenant referencing?

Based on the provided information, August's core strengths are rent tracking, compliance, communication, and document management. It does not appear to explicitly offer integrated tenant referencing or deposit protection scheme management within the described features. It excels at automating and organizing the ongoing management lifecycle rather than the initial tenant setup phases.

What's the difference between the Growth and Portfolio plans?

The Growth plan is for the standard landlord with up to 6 total tenancies. The Portfolio plan is essential for larger operations or HMO landlords, as it removes the tenancy cap, offers unlimited document storage, and adds specific HMO support with room-level management. If you have more than 6 tenancies or run HMOs, the Portfolio plan is the necessary and recommended choice.

What is a credit and how is it calculated?

Credits are Gaffa's unit of consumption for its API. You are billed credits based on two primary factors: request time and proxy bandwidth. Browser runtime is charged at 1 credit per 30 seconds (or 2 credits per 30 seconds if screen recording is enabled). Additionally, any request that uses a residential proxy (by specifying a proxy_location) consumes 1500 credits per 1GB of bandwidth used. Each successful request deducts the corresponding credits from your monthly plan allowance.

Does Gaffa offer a free trial?

Yes, absolutely. You can sign up for a free account and immediately begin using the full Gaffa API to build and test automations. The key point is that the free tier allows you to run your automations exclusively on Gaffa's dedicated demo site (demo.gaffa.dev). This lets you experiment with all features, understand the API response format, and build your scripts without any cost before upgrading to a paid plan to run on the open web.

What is your refund policy?

Gaffa offers a straightforward refund policy. If you request a refund before using any credits within your current billing cycle (month), they will be happy to issue one. This policy is designed to be fair and low-risk for new users who may find the service isn't a fit shortly after subscribing, provided they haven't consumed resources.

Do unused credits roll over to the next month?

No, credits do not roll over. The credit allowances included in your monthly subscription plan (Starter, Startup, Growth) are reset at the start of each new billing cycle. Any credits you do not use by the end of the month are forfeited. This is a common model in utility-based APIs and encourages efficient planning of your automation workloads.

August is a UK-focused property management software designed to simplify the chaotic life of self-managing landlords and HMO owners. It falls squarely into the category of landlord tech, aiming to automate compliance, rent tracking, and tenant communication. Landlords often seek alternatives for a few key reasons. Some find the pricing structure doesn't fit their portfolio size, while others need features tailored for different property types or more advanced accounting. The platform's specific focus on the UK market might also not suit those with international holdings. When evaluating other options, prioritize what actually saves you time. Look for robust automation in rent collection and compliance alerts, a tenant portal that actually gets used, and reporting that gives you clear insights without spreadsheet gymnastics. The right tool should feel like a proactive assistant, not just another digital filing cabinet.

Gaffa is a powerful web automation and data extraction API designed for developers. It falls squarely into the productivity and management category, as it saves teams from the immense engineering overhead of building and maintaining their own scraping infrastructure. By handling real browsers, proxies, and CAPTCHAs through a simple REST API, it lets you focus on using data, not fighting to collect it. Users often look for alternatives for a few key reasons. Pricing is a major factor, as needs can range from small personal projects to massive enterprise-scale operations. Some may require specific features Gaffa lacks, like a local SDK or integration with a particular tech stack, while others might be on a different platform like Python instead of Node.js. When evaluating alternatives, prioritize reliability against modern bot detection above all. Look for solutions that use real browsers and quality residential proxies. Consider the developer experience: is the API or SDK intuitive? Finally, assess the total cost of ownership, factoring in not just subscription fees but also the engineering time you'll save or spend on maintenance.