AMTdirect vs Black Owl Systems is no longer a comparison of two products. MRI Software bought AMTdirect in January 2021 and folded it into MRI ProLease, so the real choice is MRI ProLease against Black Owl Systems. ProLease is an occupier platform for lease administration and accounting that lists GASB 87. Black Owl is a dedicated ASC 842 and IFRS 16 subledger. Neither publishes a price.
This comparison is for US controllers, lease accountants and real estate leads who found both names on a shortlist, often from a review directory that still lists AMTdirect as a standalone vendor. Every fact below comes from MRI's and Black Owl's own sites. Where a vendor describes itself, we say so.
AMTdirect vs Black Owl Systems at a glance
| Factor | AMTdirect (now MRI ProLease) | Black Owl Systems |
|---|---|---|
| Can you buy it today? | Not under the AMTdirect name. You buy MRI ProLease | Yes |
| What it is | Lease administration and lease accounting platform for occupiers | Lease accounting subledger, lessee and lessor |
| Standards listed | ASC 842, GASB 87, IFRS 16, FRS 102 | ASC 842, IFRS 16, ASPE 3065 |
| Lease types | Real estate and equipment, including fleet, IT and machinery, plus subleases | Lease portfolios of finance teams closing the books |
| Published price | None. Demo and brochure only | None. Five tiers, each Contact Sales |
| Pricing basis | Quote by edition, modules and portfolio size | Lease volume, unlimited users and entities, no charge for inactive leases |
| Editions | Enterprise, Central, Direct (and Express outside the US) | Small Business, Large Companies, Enterprise, CPA Essentials, CPA Advanced |
| Setup | "Live in weeks, not months" per MRI | "Four to eight weeks" per Black Owl |
The short version: if you want one system that tracks the leases, the critical dates, CAM and the accounting for a corporate real estate portfolio, you are shopping MRI ProLease. If you already track leases somewhere and only need the ASC 842 schedules, journal entries and disclosures done well, Black Owl is the narrower and usually lighter purchase. Both need clean lease data before they produce a single correct number, and that part you can price today without a demo.
What happened to AMTdirect?
MRI Software announced its acquisition of AMTdirect on 27 January 2021. AMTdirect was a North Carolina vendor of lease accounting, lease administration and facilities software for corporate occupiers, backed by Luminate Capital Partners before the sale. Today amtdirect.com forwards to MRI's lease accounting pages and the AMT name is gone from MRI's product list.
That matters for a comparison. Review directories still show AMTdirect with its old description ("designed for portfolios with 50 or more locations"), and their side-by-side pages put it next to Black Owl as if both were independent vendors. They are not. If you book an AMTdirect demo, you will be talking to MRI about ProLease. Our AMTdirect alternatives page covers the acquisition in more detail, and the MRI ProLease pricing and editions guide explains the four editions MRI sells now.
Is Black Owl Systems better than AMTdirect?
Black Owl is better if your problem is lease accounting alone: a mid-market finance team that needs ASC 842 or IFRS 16 schedules, journal entries and footnotes, with pricing tied to lease count and users included. MRI ProLease, where AMTdirect now lives, is better if you need lease administration, critical dates, CAM, equipment leases and GASB 87 in one occupier system.
The two are sold to different people. MRI describes ProLease with platform numbers: 3,500 occupier clients, more than 1,000 lease accounting implementations and 8.8 million leases managed. Those are MRI's own figures. Black Owl pitches the accounting team directly, with CPA-led implementation and tiers built for CPA firms that run lease accounting for clients. One conversation starts with your real estate department, the other with your controller.
How much does AMTdirect cost compared with Black Owl Systems?
Neither publishes a price. MRI's ProLease pages end in "Request demo", "Get the Brochure" or "Download Data Sheet", with no dollar figure on any edition. Black Owl's pricing page lists five tiers, Small Business, Large Companies, Enterprise, CPA Essentials and CPA Advanced, and every one of them has a Contact Sales button. Black Owl does publish its basis: lease volume, with unlimited users and entities and no charge for inactive leases.
Review directories print numbers for both, such as "from $4,500 per year" for ProLease. Neither vendor publishes those figures, so treat them as placeholders and get a written quote. What you can say with confidence:
- ProLease will cost more in year one for most buyers, because it is a full platform with an implementation and more modules to license.
- Black Owl scales with lease count, which keeps it predictable for a portfolio that is not growing fast.
- Both quotes leave out the same thing: the cost of getting accurate lease data into the system in the first place.
Our lease software pricing roundup lists which vendors in this market publish a figure, and there are only a handful.
Does Black Owl Systems support GASB 87?
Black Owl's pricing tiers list ASC 842, IFRS 16 and ASPE, and GASB appears only in a general FAQ answer, not as a supported standard on any tier. MRI lists GASB 87 on the ProLease page. For a US city, county, school district or public university, confirm GASB in writing before a demo, because that single line can end the comparison. Our GASB 87 lease accounting software comparison covers vendors built for governmental reporting.
Which is better for a company leaving AMTdirect?
If you are a legacy AMTdirect customer, you are already an MRI customer, and staying on ProLease is the path of least disruption. Moving to Black Owl makes sense when you have decided that lease administration can live elsewhere (a spreadsheet, a facilities system, or your ERP) and you only want a stronger accounting engine.
| Your situation | Likely fit | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Corporate occupier, 100+ locations, real estate team owns leases | MRI ProLease | One system for dates, CAM, equipment and accounting |
| Public entity with a GASB 87 deadline | MRI ProLease or a GASB-first vendor | Black Owl does not list GASB on its tiers |
| Finance team with 30 to 300 leases, ASC 842 close only | Black Owl Systems | Subledger priced on lease volume, users included |
| CPA firm running lease accounting for clients | Black Owl Systems | CPA Essentials and CPA Advanced tiers |
| Legacy AMT customer happy with the product | Stay on MRI ProLease | No migration, same vendor |
Whichever way you go, the migration step is where budgets slip. Old AMT records were keyed years ago against leases that have since been amended, and exporting them moves the errors into the new system faster. If your legacy system only gives you PDF reports, you can convert those PDF report tables to Excel to reconcile them, but the safer source is the executed lease itself.
Get the lease data right before either demo
Both platforms run on the same inputs: commencement and expiration dates, rent schedules and escalations, free rent, renewal and termination options, CAM and pass-throughs, and every amendment that changed them. If those inputs are wrong, ProLease tracks the wrong dates and Black Owl books the wrong liability.
LeaseAbstracts lease abstraction software reads each lease and amendment, returns more than 200 fields with every value linked to the page and clause it came from, and exports to Excel or CSV in a layout you can map to either vendor's import template. Plans start at $49 a month for 15 leases, with Team at $149 for 75 and Firm at $399 for 250. You arrive at implementation with a verified file, and the "data migration" line on the quote shrinks to loading it.
Other Black Owl Systems comparisons
If Black Owl is on your list against a different vendor, we have compared it head to head with Crunchafi (formerly LeaseCrunch), Visual Lease, LeaseQuery and Nakisa. The Black Owl Systems alternatives and pricing page collects the rest.