Signable vs DocuSign for Landlords (2026): Lease Signing Compared
- Is Signable legally valid for signing leases in the U.S.? Yes — Signable's e-signatures are compliant with the U.S. ESIGN Act and the eIDAS framework, the same legal basis DocuSign relies on. Residential leases signed electronically are enforceable in virtually every state.…
- How much does Signable actually cost for a small landlord? If you sign fewer than ~30 documents a year, Pay As You Go at roughly £1–£1.50 per envelope is the cheapest option — a dozen leases a year costs about £12–£18 total. The Small plan (~£29/mo, 50 envelopes/mo) fits…
- Does DocuSign Personal's 5-envelope limit include addenda? Yes — every signing request counts as an envelope the moment you send it, whether it's a lease, an addendum, a renewal, or a notice. Five envelopes a month is roughly 60 a year, so a landlord with steady turnover can…
Signable vs DocuSign for Landlords (2026): Lease Signing Compared
Every landlord eventually hits the same friction point: a lease that needs signing before move-in, an addendum that needs initials mid-tenancy, and a tenant asking "can't I just sign this on my phone?" The two names that dominate this conversation couldn't be more different. DocuSign is the e-signature giant — the brand tenants already trust. Signable is the lean challenger that built its pricing around pay-per-envelope simplicity.
The difference that matters for a rental business isn't the brand — it's the volume math. A landlord sends a trickle of documents compared to a sales team. Which tool taxes that trickle least, and which one stays cheap when the portfolio grows? That's what this comparison answers.
Affiliate disclosure: we're a Signable affiliate — we earn 10% commission on any plan purchase for up to 1 year, paid out monthly via PayPal or Stripe. Our link carries a 90-day cookie, refreshed if you click again, with no minimum payout threshold. DocuSign is covered here as a plain reference; we have no affiliate relationship with them.
General information only — not legal advice. Electronic-signature validity rules vary by state and document type; confirm your state's requirements before going fully paperless.
The Short Version
| Signable | DocuSign | |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | UK-based e-signature platform, envelope-count pricing | The e-signature market leader, per-user subscription pricing |
| Cheapest route in | Pay As You Go: ~£1 per envelope, no subscription | Personal: $10/mo billed annually ($15 month-to-month), 5 envelopes/mo |
| Entry subscription | Small: ~£29/mo, 50 envelopes/mo | Personal: $10/mo billed annually, 5 envelopes/mo |
| Mid tier | Medium: ~£69/mo, 150 envelopes/mo | Standard: $25/user/mo billed annually, 100 envelopes/user/yr |
| Top tier | Large ~£169/mo (400) / Corporate ~£299/mo (750); bespoke above | Business Pro: $40/user/mo billed annually, bulk send, payments |
| Free option | 14-day free trial, no card required | 30-day free trial only; no free plan |
| Branding | Custom branding from Small plan up | Branding on higher plans |
| API access | Included from Small plan up | Higher tiers (Business Pro / custom) |
| Bulk send | Medium plan and up | Business Pro |
| Best for | Low-to-moderate volume landlords who want per-document pricing and generous envelopes | Landlords who value maximum brand trust and already live in DocuSign's ecosystem |
(Pricing: Signable lists prices in GBP and updates them periodically — figures above are from its current plan structure checked October 2026, with VAT extra in some listings; DocuSign figures are from its 2026 pricing. Prices change; verify the current price on each provider's pricing page before you buy.)
Signable: The Pay-Per-Envelope Challenger
Signable is a Bristol-based e-signature company built around a simple idea: you shouldn't need a seat license to send a document. Its plans count envelopes (documents sent for signature), not users — every plan includes unlimited users and unlimited templates, which is unusual and genuinely landlord-friendly when a spouse or property manager sends documents too.
Pay As You Go (~£1–£1.50 per envelope): no subscription, no commitment, pay only for documents you send. For a landlord signing a handful of leases a year, this is the cheapest legitimate e-signature route on the market — five leases a year costs roughly five envelopes, not a monthly subscription.
Small (~£29/mo or ~£319/yr): 50 envelopes per month, unlimited users and templates, custom branding, and API access. Fifty envelopes a month is far more than most small landlords need — it covers leases, addenda, renewals, and move-in/out paperwork with room to spare.
Medium (~£69/mo or ~£759/yr): 150 envelopes per month, plus team collaboration tools and bulk sending — one document to many recipients, useful for sending the same renewal offer or notice to dozens of tenants.
Large (~£169/mo, 400 envelopes) and Corporate (~£299/mo, 750 envelopes): growing-portfolio territory, with concierge onboarding, IP allowlisting, and dedicated account management at the top end. Bespoke plans cover anything above that.
Feature-wise, Signable covers the essentials: full audit trail on every document, sequential and parallel signing orders, document expiry dates, one-click reminders to slow signers, password protection, multi-factor authentication, and full legal compliance under eIDAS and the U.S. ESIGN Act. Signers never need an account — they get an email, click, and sign on any device. A 14-day free trial with no credit card lets you run a real lease through it before committing.
The honest caveats: Signable is a signature tool, not a document-management suite — it doesn't draft your lease or store a template library of state-specific legal forms. Its template and integration ecosystem is smaller than DocuSign's, and brand recognition with tenants is lower (though tenants only see your branding and a clean signing page). Pricing in GBP means U.S. landlords absorb currency fluctuation.
Try Signable's pay-as-you-go or a paid plan here — the 14-day free trial needs no credit card.
DocuSign: The Signature Standard
DocuSign is the name tenants already trust. When an applicant or tenant gets a signing request from DocuSign, nobody asks what it is — with well over a million paying customers and integrations with virtually every business platform, it's the default e-signature infrastructure. That recognition is a real, if soft, asset when you're asking strangers to sign legally binding documents on their phone.
Personal ($10/mo billed annually, $15 month-to-month): single user, 5 envelopes per month. An envelope is one signing request — it counts the moment you send it, signed or not. Five envelopes covers a landlord signing one or two leases plus the odd addendum, but it's tight: a busy turnover month can eat it.
Standard ($25/user/mo billed annually): up to 50 users, 100 envelopes per user per year, shared team templates, real-time collaborative commenting. The plan most small businesses land on — but note the math: 100 envelopes per year is about 8 per month, and it's per-user pricing, so two people on the plan doubles the cost.
Business Pro ($40/user/mo billed annually): everything in Standard plus bulk sending, payment collection, signer attachments, and advanced fields. Bulk sending matters if you push the same renewal or policy notice to many tenants at once.
The DocuSign advantage is depth: the most polished signing experience in the industry, the broadest integration library (connecting to most property-management and storage platforms), and the strongest brand trust with signers. If you already use DocuSign for other business, adding leases to it is frictionless.
The honest limitation is cost structure. DocuSign prices per user and caps envelopes; a small landlord with a spouse on the plan is paying two seats for what is fundamentally a few-dozen-documents-a-year workload. And DocuSign is a signature tool, not a forms platform — it doesn't collect rental applications or run intake logic. For the application-collection side of paperwork, see our Jotform vs DocuSign comparison.
Head-to-Head: The Landlord Workflow
Signing a new lease
Both handle this well. Upload the lease PDF, place signature and initial fields, send — the tenant signs on any device without creating an account. DocuSign wins on signer familiarity; Signable wins on cost. A landlord signing 15 leases a year spends roughly 15 envelopes: on Signable's PAYG that's about £15 a year total, while DocuSign Personal costs $120 a year minimum (or $180 month-to-month). That's an order-of-magnitude gap for identical functionality.
Addenda and renewals
Renewal season is where envelope caps bite. Ten renewals plus five addenda is 15 envelopes in a month — triple DocuSign Personal's allowance, and it would eat into a Standard plan's 100-per-year budget fast. On Signable's Small plan, the same month is a rounding error inside 50 monthly envelopes; on PAYG it's about £15. High-volume paperwork months strongly favor Signable's pricing model. If renewals are your recurring headache, our lease renewal playbook covers the strategy side.
Bulk sending the same document
Sending one notice or renewal offer to many tenants at once: Signable includes bulk send from its Medium plan (~£69/mo); DocuSign requires Business Pro ($40/user/mo). Signable's bulk-send entry price is higher as a headline number, but it's not per-user — a three-person team pays one £69 subscription on Signable versus three $40 DocuSign seats. Per-user pricing punishes teams; envelope pricing doesn't.
Templates and repeatable paperwork
Both offer unlimited templates (Signable on every plan; DocuSign via team plans), so your lease, application-consent form, and pet addendum become one-click starting points. Signable's API access from the Small plan up is notably generous — DocuSign reserves API access for higher tiers. If you ever want to trigger signature requests automatically from your property-management software, Signable's lower API bar matters.
Brand trust with tenants
DocuSign wins outright. Tenants have seen DocuSign before; Signable they haven't. In practice this matters less than it sounds — the tenant sees your branding and a clean signing page, and the legal validity comes from the audit trail, not the logo. But if your tenant base is older or less tech-comfortable, the familiar DocuSign envelope reduces "is this a scam?" friction.
The legal question
Both platforms produce e-signatures compliant with the U.S. ESIGN Act and UETA framework, which covers residential leases in virtually every state — electronic leases are enforceable. Edge cases exist (some states have specific requirements around certain notices, and a few document types like wills are excluded from electronic signing), which is why this article is general information, not legal advice. Keep the audit trail with your lease file either way.
Which One Should You Use?
Use Signable when you send a low-to-moderate document volume and want the cheapest honest price for it. Pay As You Go is the standout value for landlords signing under ~30 documents a year — no subscription, no wasted seats. The Small plan's 50 envelopes a month is generous headroom for growing portfolios, and unlimited users means your spouse or manager signs in free. Start Signable's 14-day free trial and run a real lease through it.
Use DocuSign when maximum signer trust matters most, you already live in its ecosystem, or your document volume and team size justify per-user pricing. It's the safe, familiar, deeply integrated choice — at a price that reflects that.
Bottom line: for the typical landlord's signing volume, Signable's envelope-count pricing is dramatically cheaper — roughly £15 a year on PAYG for what DocuSign Personal charges $120+ for — with the same legal validity and a clean signing experience. DocuSign wins on brand recognition and integration depth. Match the tool to your volume: if you're signing dozens of documents a year, the math isn't close. Sign up for Signable here, and if you're hiring your team before you scale your paperwork, see how we compare tenant-screening services.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Signable legally valid for signing leases in the U.S.?
Yes — Signable's e-signatures are compliant with the U.S. ESIGN Act and the eIDAS framework, the same legal basis DocuSign relies on. Residential leases signed electronically are enforceable in virtually every state. Confirm your state's rules for any special notice requirements, and keep the platform's audit trail with your lease file.
How much does Signable actually cost for a small landlord?
If you sign fewer than ~30 documents a year, Pay As You Go at roughly £1–£1.50 per envelope is the cheapest option — a dozen leases a year costs about £12–£18 total. The Small plan (~£29/mo, 50 envelopes/mo) fits landlords with regular turnover; higher tiers scale by envelope volume. Prices are listed in GBP and change over time, so verify before buying.
Does DocuSign Personal's 5-envelope limit include addenda?
Yes — every signing request counts as an envelope the moment you send it, whether it's a lease, an addendum, a renewal, or a notice. Five envelopes a month is roughly 60 a year, so a landlord with steady turnover can hit the ceiling; overages and plan upgrades add cost.
Do tenants need a Signable or DocuSign account to sign?
No on both. The tenant receives an email link, opens the signing page on any device, and signs — no account creation, no app install required. This is standard for both platforms.
Which is better for sending the same renewal to 50 tenants?
Signable includes bulk sending from its Medium plan (~£69/mo) with no per-user fees, so a team of any size pays one subscription. DocuSign requires Business Pro ($40/user/mo), where a multi-person team multiplies the cost. For bulk landlord workflows, Signable's pricing structure is the better fit.
Can Signable replace my lease-drafting software?
No — neither Signable nor DocuSign drafts leases or provides state-specific legal forms. They sign finished documents. You still need your lease source (attorney, lease software, or template library); the signature platform handles the "get it signed" step. See our lease renewal playbook for the document strategy around renewals.
What happens to my documents if I cancel?
Both platforms let you download your signed documents and their audit trails. Download your archive before canceling any subscription — the signed PDFs with certificates of completion are your legal record, and you should store them with your lease files regardless of which platform you use.