Should I use Google Voice as the number on my rental listing?

What a landlord needs from a listing number

A rental ad puts one phone number in front of every applicant, every agent who watches new listings, and every scraper that copies them. The number is public as long as the ad is up. Copies of listings live on for months, so usually longer. The number needs to receive questions from strangers, let you answer them without giving out your own cell number, and, ideally, stop reaching you once the unit is rented.

What Google Voice does well

In the United States, Google Voice is free. It gives you a real number that takes calls and texts, has voicemail with transcripts, and rings your phone through an app. If you want a free permanent second number that answers calls, it is the right choice and you can stop reading here.

You need a Google account and an existing U.S. phone number to set it up. In Canada the free personal Google Voice is not offered; the paid Workspace version issues a U.S. number and does not text Canadian numbers.

Two limits matter for listings. The number belongs to one Google account, so two people replying as the listing number share that login. And it stays yours until you delete it, so the ad that got copied last spring still reaches you next year.

Where a listing-only number is the better tool

TheLocalRing gives you a local U.S. or Canadian number to put on the listing. Texts to it arrive in your email, in up to five inboxes, so partners or co-owners each answer from their own account and the applicant sees one number. You reply from email and it goes back as an ordinary text from the listing number. There is no app to install.

The limits: a U.S. number takes texts only, so a caller hears a short message asking them to text. Calls ring only on a Monthly Canadian number. You can reply to anyone who texted you in the last 30 days, and you cannot text someone first. No picture messages, no voicemail.

On a day, three-day, or seven-day pass the number ends: it is held for seven days after the pass, then retired or given to someone else. That is the point if you wanted a number that ends with the listing. Monthly keeps the number and renews until you cancel.

A pass is C$2.99 for one day, C$5.99 for three days, or C$7.99 for seven days, and Monthly is C$14.99 a month. Monthly starts with 14 days free, takes a card at checkout, and renews until you cancel. Day, three-day, and seven-day passes are text-only. Prices in Canadian dollars. Your card issuer converts the charge and may add a foreign transaction fee.

A short rule of thumb

• One person in the U.S. who wants calls and a number to keep: Google Voice.
• Two or more people answering one listing, a number that should end, or a Canadian listing: a listing-only number.
• Verification codes for apps or banks: not a listing-only number. Many services refuse Google Voice numbers too.
• What to write in the ad itself is a separate question, and the guide on listing a rental without your cell is linked below.

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